Following a straight run of wins in the first three
rounds of the
Italian
Rally Championship, official Pirelli test driver
Paolo Andreucci is aiming to make it four in a row at
the June 3-4 Rally Targa Florio.
Andreucci, a five-time Italian champion, will once
again compete in his Peugeot Italia 207 S2000, with
which he won the series last year on Pirelli tires.
Co-driven as always by Anna Andreussi, the 46-year-old
Italian has triumphed on the Targa Florio five times –
three of them with Pirelli – and he is
confident that he can do it once again this
weekend.
The legendary Rally Targa Florio on the Italian island
of Sicily is one of the oldest motorsports events in
the world, celebrating its 95th running this year. The
world famous rally, which has lent its name to many
road cars such as the iconic Porsche 911 Targa, is
characterized by its mountainous asphalt roads that
will challenge the tires to the very limit.
Andreucci, who developed Pirelli’s tires for the World
Rally Championship from 2008 to2010, is confident that
the P Zero asphalt rubber will give him both the
performance and durability required to challenge for
victory once more on the 255-kilometer event.
“I love the Targa Florio, but it is a very intense
sprint with lots of short stages, where there are some
very strong local specialists,” Andreucci says. “Grip
is really important here as the surfaces are incredibly
slippery and the speeds quite high; on the rare
occasions that it rains, the roads become almost
impossible,” he explains.
“We’ll be using the P Zero RX7 tires and maybe the
harder RX5 for dry asphalt, depending on the conditions
and temperatures,” Andreucci reports. “These are tires
that have given us a lot of grip in the past, helping
us to make the difference and extend our winning record
in Sicily. We’re going to test this week before the
rally gets underway and hopefully we will have a few
evolutions to try out as well.”
Other top drivers competing with Pirelli on the Targa
Florio include Alessandro Perico in a similar Peugeot
207 S2000, as well as last year’s Targa Florio winner,
Toto Riolo. In the two-wheel drive class, the leading
Pirelli competitors are Citroen Italia DS3 R3T drivers
Simone Campedelli and Andrea Crugnola. The rally also
counts towards the Italian Renault Clio Trophy and the
Mitsubishi Evolution Cup.
For more information, visit www.us.pirelli.com.
