Gundersen and Evjen confirms Euro RX. Dubourg wins in Andros. Dall’olmo is DiRT World Champ.

21 December    Cooper Tires is announced as the title sponsor for the 2020 Motorsport UK British Rallycross Championship Five Nations Challenge. Cooper will also supply control tyres for all categories in the BRX events. The deal covers the next three years.

22 December    The second round of the Trophee Andros in Andorra is hit by poor weather conditions that reduces the programme and means drivers take away just one points score from the weekend. Aurelien Panis (Audi) wins ahead of his father with JB Dubourg (Renault ZOE) third. Andreas Bakkerud (Audi) has a difficult event and places ninth.

30 December    CARX – the Argentine and South American Rallycross Championship – announces its 2020 calendar. The championship will run over seven rounds but no venues host countries have yet been named. CARX 2020: 1, 21-22 March; 2, 23-24 May; 3 20-21 June; 4, 18-19 July; 5 15-16 August; 6 19-20 September; 7 30 October – 1 November.

6 January    The first driver announcement of the year is from Sondre Evjen who will return for a second season in the FIA European Rallycross Championship for Supercar with Swedish team Volkswagen Dealerteam Bauhaus. The 21-year-old Norwegian racer placed seventh in the 2019 Euro RX series, twice making the final in the six event championship with fifth place in Latvia his best result. His 2019 deal was done just before the season started so left no time for testing, something team boss Tommy Kristoffersson wants to correct this year. “Now it’s time to do it the right way. We want to offer Sondre the best possible car. Given the proper conditions we know that he is fast. At this stage we are not looking at the title race. Our focus is more on building a great platform for Sondre’s further career,” he said.

9 January    Tristan Ovenden uses Autosport International to announce that he will race a Supercar in the Motorsport UK British Rallycross Championship Five Nations Challenge. Ovenden has won the the BRX Supernational category for the last three years, taking his third straight title in 2019 when he won every round of the championship in his Renault Clio V6. He also made his Supercar debut last year, racing a Citroen DS3 in the Supercar support event at the British TitansRX event at Lydden. His own team will now run an ex-Doran DS3 – which was on show at Autosport International – in the domestic championship. “It’s good that the car is coming from the Doran team, they’re obviously heavily involved in the series so we can look to them for any advice we might need and they’re happy to give it to us. I just need time in the seat, it will be different to what we’ve done before but it’s more that it’s different rather than it’s that much faster than the Clio. We just want to upset a few people, we’re not out to set any records or do anything too dramatic to start with, we just want to get some solid weekends and see if we can get some reasonable results,” said Ovenden.

10 January    #YellowSquad names Czech teenager Dan Skocdopole as its first RX2 driver. The former kart racer was Czech national champion in 2015 and WSK KRS World Series champion in 2016. He has raced in rallycross over the last two years in which he has raced Super1600 and Supercar machinery. “I’m really excited to be joining #YellowSquad in RX2 this season. It’s a dream come true to be working with Kevin and Timmy Hansen. It will be a big test for me in RX2 as I know the competition will be very tough, but I feel this is a good step in my career to take and I am ready to get going in Barcelona,” said Skocdopole who will also contest the RallyX Nordic Supercar Lites category with the team this year.  

10 January    JB Dubourg takes his first Trophee Andros victory of the 2019-2020 season, giving the Renault ZOE its first win in the process. Dubourg’s win comes in the first day of the third event of the series at Isola 2000. Yan Ehrlacher (Dupessey) takes the Sunday victory over Aurelien Panis (Audi) who continues to lead at the mid-point of the championship. Dubourg is classified seventh on the second day. Andreas Bakkerud (Audi) takes a pair of ninth places from the weekend.

11 January    With cars on show and in the Live Action arena at Autosport International, the BTRDA Clubmans Rallycross Championship also uses the show to reveal that Cooper Tires will be its new title sponsor. The BTRDA Clubmans Rallycross Championship presented by Cooper Tires will allow free tyre choice in 2020, with all except the SuperModified and Classic classes switching to Cooper control tyres in 2021.

12 January    The finals of the DiRT Rally 2.0 World Series takes place at Autosport International where French gamer Killian Dall’olmo (SDL_Kinou) wins four of the six qualifying races and the final to secure the world title. Briton Dave Marshall (DM Racing 66) places second ahead of Sweden’s Daniel Johansson (TwoTwoOne).

14 January    Former FIA European Rallycross Champion Ben-Philip Gundersen will graduate to the Euro Supercar category for the 2020 season when he will drive a JC Raceteknik Audi S1. The Norwegian driver has raced in RX2 for the last two years, winning four events and placing fourth in 2018 before becoming series runner-up in 2019. He won the Supercar Lites title in the RallyX Nordic series last year. “Even though RX2 is the best school you can go to, to prepare for the highest class, it’s still very different from driving a Supercar. I expect many of the other drivers to have raced Supercar before, so it will be hard competition. I think it will be sensible to get a feel for everything in the first race, to compare with the other European drivers and then take it from there. I think our goals will evolve over the course of the season,” said Gundersen.

16 January    JC Raceteknik Juniorteam is the first team to confirm participation in RallyX Nordic’s new Xtreme Junior series. The team will run 13-year-old Alex Gustafsson in the Junior category while its 2019 crosskart racer Isak Reiersen (16) will return for second season in the adult class. Gustafsson raced similar buggies in Finland last year, placing second in the series.

Also    If you’re getting cabin fever and need to get out there and see some racing, the first rallycross event of the year is this Saturday (18 Jan) when the third round of the Winterseries will be run at Lydden Hill.