Mini's WRC world rally return confirmed with the reveal of Kris Meeke's Prodrive Countryman
Mini confirmed its return to the World Rally Championship with the Countryman WRC car, unveiled at the 2010 Paris motor show. Its entry into the 2011 FIA World Rally Championship marks Mini’s return to a sport in which it has tasted great success in the past and Rally Sweden (February 10 2011) will see a Mini tackle a stage at rally’s top table in anger for the first time since 1968. The new Countryman SUV has proved a controversial choice as a base car but the new Mini WRC has been developed alongside the hugely successful Prodrive, which surely bodes well for the 2011 season. To be piloted by former Intercontinental Rally Champion (and Brit) Kris Meeke, the new car will use a 300bhp 1.6-litre, direct injection four-cylinder engine. Mini has thus far refused to make public any further technical details. The proud motorsport heritage of Mini means its return to the sport will be very welcome news to true rally aficionados. Extensive rallying success throughout the 1960s at the hands of drivers such as Paddy Hopkirk & John Cooper means Mini is still one of the most emotive brands in the business and it returns for selected rounds of the 2011 World Rally Championship with much expectation.
Read Henry Catchpole's Blog on who should get the second Mini WRC seat here
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2014 — :Eurolamp World Rally Team[edit]
Valery Gorban’s career has been undergoing changes since 2014. The team completely changed its colors and naming sponsor. Bright red colors became a thing of the past. Instead, Mini Cooper RRC got its new appearance - bright green with a red stripe alongside. Eurolamp brand has first become recognizable and associated with the up-to-date technologies in motor sport and thereafter in everyday life.
2009—2013: Mentos Ascania Racing[edit]
In 2009, the name of the Gorban team appears for the first time the name of its main company – Ascania. The season of 2009 did not become a breakthrough, although he brought the pilot the first podium in the Bukovina rally in two years, and the team headed by him returned to the top of the standings. But 2010 turned out to be much more successful.
2008: Prime Rally Team[edit]
The 2008 season begins for Valery and his team with a change of image – the side of the cars is decorated with the logo of the new title sponsor, the alcohol brand Prime. By a strange coincidence, this season becomes the worst in Gorban's career – he manages to finish only twice in the races of the championship of Ukraine, never once taking the podium. Unsuccessfully things are going on and the team – for the first time in its history, it falls to the third place in the standings of collectives. As a result, cooperation with the vodka ceases, and in the new season, the people of Kiev are under a new brand.
2002—2007: MacCoffee Rally Team[edit]
The career of Valery Gorban is one of the few examples of what results can be achieved by coming to motor sport at a fairly mature age. For the first time in his life Valery sat behind the wheel of a sports car in 2002, at the age of 29, already being a businessman, creator and head of the racing team MacCoffee Rally Team. During the 2002 season in the Ukrainian Rally Championship, team colors were defended by Alexander Salyuk, Sr. and Alexander Salyuk, Jr .; Gorban joined them only at the final stage of the championship in Kherson.
Already in the following year, 2003, Valery Gorban and his navigator Evgeny Leonov as part of the MacCoffee Rally Team are conducting the full Ukrainian championship in rallying the Lada 2112 Super 1600 car. Having won five races out of six possible, the crew becomes the champion in the A9 class, and MacCoffee again wins in the team classification.
Valeriy Gorban (Ukrainian: Валерій Горбань, born February 6, 1973) is a rally driver from Ukraine,master of sports of the international class of Ukraine, two-time absolute champion of Ukraine in rally, bronze medalist of the World Rally Championship in the standings Production WRC , pilot and head of the rally team Eurolamp WRT.
Valery Gorban is the champion among Ukrainian rallyists in the number of starts: for the period from 2002 to 2019 he took part in 185 national and international competitions.
The crew of Valery Gorban and Yevgeny Leonov is the owner of the record among Ukrainian crews by the number of races held together – for the period from 2003 to 2011 the pilots started together 86 times.