During today’s press conference by Volkswagen Sweden in Stockholm it was officially released what ERC24 has hinted for some time: Circuit racer Johan Kristoffersson and rising Rally star Pontus Tidemand are set to attack their native RallycrossRX round at Höljes with two VW Scirocco Mk3 SuperCars.
Johan Kristoffersson is, at least so far, a tarmac-only racer and the son of ex-Rallycross star with Audi, Tommy Kristoffersson. Pontus Tidemand is a promising Rally driver, the son of ex-Rallycrosser with Mitsubishi Tomas Tidemand as well as the stepson of Henning Solberg, and has already collected a bit of SuperCar experience in the GRC series. Both youngsters have now been appointed by the Swedish Volkswagen importer to represent the VW colours in 2013 Rallycross events.
“Rallycross is a very attractive motorsport for the public and close to Volkswagen Motorsport’s own activities in Rallying. Beside this the STCC series is also open to Rallycross racing from 2014 on. At the same time we are promoting 4Motion, our four-wheel drive system. Therefore, it is attractive for us to back a programme in Rallycross”, claimed Sten Forsberg of Volkswagen Sweden. “We find the Swedish commitment very interesting and will watch it with great care”, said Jost Capito of Volkswagen Motorsport.
“This is a really good project, we are very proud of it and will do our best to get the necessary results to prove that we deserve the trust”, expressed KMS principal Tommy Kristoffersson, himself a successful Rallycrosser of the 1990s with almost 700bhp strong Audi quattro and Audi Coupé S2 SuperCars. “For the ERX round at Höljes we are ready to enter Johan and Pontus [Tidemand is going to drive the VW Scirocco Mk3 SuperCar of Belgian Jochen Coox], but for the remaining events we have not taken a decision about our choice of drivers yet. Beside Johan and Pontus we see in Robin Larsson, the son of double ERC winner Lars Larsson, a capable replacement for guest drives during the season.”
As it was casually mentioned that KMS has set its focus on developing a new Rallycross car now, we at ERC24 have tried to find out some more info on this. In the process we have learned from Sweden that Ingvar Gunnarsson Motorsport is already working on a second VW Polo Mk5 SuperCar, similar to the Polo of Anton Marklund…
- 2013 Rallycross Schedule for VW Dealer Team/KMS:
- 11.05. Strängnäs Motorstadion/Strängnäs – SRC
- 01.06. Westombanan/Arvika – SRC
- 08.06. Solvalla Travbana/Stockholm – Invitation Event
- 29.06. Höghedenbanan/Älvsbyn – SRC
- 07.07. Höljesbanan/Höljes – ERX
- 17.08. Högstabanan/Handen – SRC
- 05.10. Kinnekulle Ring/Götene – SRC
