Gigi Galli and his citroen-Pirelli hit bad luck on the Swedish Rally

GIGI GALLI AND HIS CITROËN-PIRELLI
HIT BAD LUCK ON THE SWEDISH RALLY

After encountering brake problems yesterday, a broken clutch slows down Gigi on the final day. The young Patrik Flodin - driving a Subaru Impreza WRC on Pirelli tyres - finishes in front of him.

Karlstad (S), 11th February '07 -The season's first outing for Gigi Galli and Giovanni Bernacchini in their Citroën Xsara WRC equipped with Pirelli tyres ended with the Italian crew at the tail end of the leaderboard, due to mechanical problems today and yesterday that prevented them from moving up the classification. An off-road excursion on the opening day that cost more than four minutes, the brake problems encountered yesterday, and finally a clutch failure on the final leg all led to an end result - 13th overall - that far from corresponded to the crew's high hopes before the start.

However, as Galli himself pointed out, after the unfortunate impact with a snowbank on Friday: "Our chances of a good result were completely gone. So I preferred to use the remaining time to get to know the car better and build up experience on snow. It is a surface I will encounter again next Thursday in Norway, where I will once more benefit from our new PZero tyres, with longer 8mm studs. The problems with the brake and clutch slowed down our progress, so I decided that there was no point in pushing hard under these circumstances."

Young Swede Patrik Flodin finished in front of Galli, on his debut in a Subaru Impreza WRC equipped with Pirelli PZero tyres. Flodin - whose results in a Group N Subaru Impreza running on Pirellis were frequently impressive last year - could be more than satisfied with his performance.

"The end result is certainly not what we were hoping for," said Pirelli Competizioni's Rally Manager Mario Isola. "Now Gigi and Giovanni will concentrate on preparing themselves fully for Rally Norway, where they can rely on the latest evolutions of our PZero tyres, with the studs - which are of varying lengths according to the nature of the surfaces - vulcanized into the tread. I am also very happy with the excellent debut of a young talent like Patrik Flodin in the Subaru Impreza WRC, and for the strong performances of Oskar Svedlund and Anton Alen in the Group N Subaru Impreza STi."


For more information and pictures on Pirelli's motorsport activities visit: www.pirellicompetizioni.com

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