Seven Days, Aug 1

While the rest of Europe is still enjoying its summer break, France has again been a hive of rallycross activity this week.

The sixth round of the French Rallycross Championship took place at Kerlabo last weekend, where for the first time this season it wasn’t Jerome Grosset-Janin who took the spoils in the Supercar category. Instead victory went to Fabien Pailler, who piloted his Peugeot 208 to its first rallycross victory, indeed the first for the car in the sport.

Second to Pailler was…Pailler, Jean Luc driving an older Peugeot 207 to second place,  initially leading the final but ultimately beaten by son Fabien. Making it three Peugeots on the podium, Jean Juin guided his 207 to third place with Herve “Knapick” (Citroen DS3) fourth. The event also counted as a points-scoring round of the Rallycross Challenge, for which Jean Luc Pailler claimed top points ahead of Patrick Van Mechelen (Ford Fiesta).

Laurent Chartrain (Citroen C2) topped the order in Super1600, ahead of Fabien Chanoine (Dacia Sandero) and David Olivier (Renault Twingo), while Christophe Saunois (Toyota Corolla) won Division Three and Sebastien Le Ferrand (Peugeot 306) took victory in Division Four. Fabien Grosset-Janin won the hotly contested new-for-2013 Twingo Cup.

Just three days after the French event, Knapick Competition had re-prepped the Citroen DS3 Supercar that had been used by “Knapick” himself at Kerlabo, and tested with Sebastian Leob at Loeheac in preparation for the next round of RallycrossRX, held on the same circuit on 31^st Aug / 1^st Sept. Loeb was joined at the test by the Citroen C4 of RallycrossRX Frenchman Davy Jeanney. Hundreds of media and fans flocked to see Loeb’s laps in the car, a sign of things to come at the venue at the end of the month.

X-Games LA takes place this coming weekend, biggest of the news in the lead up to the event is that current RallycrossRX leader Timur Timerzyanov will drive a Marklund Motorsport VW Polo in the event. Timerzyanov had previously stood in for Travis Pastrana in the Red Bull Dodge Dart team, but will pilot the Polo used to good effect by Mattias Ekstrom at the RallycrossRX Rallycross of Sweden last month.

Making his debut outside Europe is Latvian Reinis Nitiss, the RallycrossRX Super1600 leader travels to LA to compete in the Supercar Lite category.

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