Henning's pace a cause for optimism

After setting stage times in Mexico which left the factory Ford team drivers trailing in his wake, Stobart M-Sport Ford Rally Team driver Henning Solberg is optimistic his good form will carry on to the next WRC round in Jordan.

The Norwegian was faster than Ford drivers Mikko Hirvonen and Jari-Matti Latvala on seven of Rally Mexico's 21 stages and his pace on Saturday - which included a second-fastest time on the 23.27km SS11 Duarte - prompted the works team to adopt some of Henning's settings on their cars.

On only his second rally using English pace notes read by new co-driver Ilka Minor, Solberg went on to finish sixth, less than thirty seconds behind Latvala.

"It was a good rally and I feel happy with the car and the pace notes," said Solberg. "The only problem really was the brakes, because I'm still using them too much. Especially in the mornings I used them all up, but that's my fault - a bit stupid from my side. Apart from that there is not much we could have done better.

"After the weekend I'm feeling optimistic about Jordan. I think we will be really quick there and the car will be much faster because we are under the sea level." he added.

Solberg's team-mate Matthew Wilson collected manufacturers' championship points for Stobart under SuperRally rules after crashing out of the event on Saturday morning. “Obviously we’re frustrated at what happened on Saturday because we had been going well and this was an event we thought we could take a really good result from," said Wilson. "We went back out on Sunday and tried a few different things with our setup. It was quite a bit better but it’s always disappointing to be SuperRallying.

“The team picked up another good haul of points at a very difficult event," concluded Stobart team principal Malcolm Wilson.

"Henning turned in a very good performance throughout the whole weekend. His four top-three times on Saturday were particularly impressive and I hope he can continue producing that kind of form over the rest of the season. Matthew will be disappointed to have had his rally cut short on Saturday as he’s not made many mistakes over the past year, but he will dust himself off and look to get back among the points at Rally Jordan,” he added.