At the Geneva Motor Show was shown a concept car Peugeot 207 RCup - representative of a new (and still very problematic) Super 2000 rally class. At the premiere, attended by director of the sports department of Peugeot, Jean-Pierre Nicolas, and I do not miss the opportunity to talk with him. - Nice to see that, despite the official decision of PSA on the completion of the active participation of the factory teams in the world championship, Peugeot does not stop work to rally projects. - We plan to finish work on a new car in late May and early June to begin the tests. Finally, the car will be ready by the end of the year: We plan to its homologation in November, but a formal presentation to the press are going to hold in September. Now completing work on body and refine the delivery schedule required details. While we definitely fit as planned. With regard to part of sports, the car is intended for use only by private teams and no formal applications from Peugeot is not planned. We expect that the importers of brands and local dealers will be our customers, speaking at the Peugeot 207 RCup both stages of the World Cup and at the regional rally. In the regional championships, these machines can be a primary and a very attractive category: they look great and issue a "right" exhaust sound ... - Quite a strange name - 207 RCup. - It's an idea marketers. Everything began with the presentation of the Frankfurt three-wheeled concept called "20 Cup», which was to demonstrate the future of 207-series. In our case, the letter R means the Rally, and the word emphasizes the sporty character of the Cup car. There is another reason. I (and not just to me) it seems that the very name of the Super 2000 is not too successfully - a feeling that this project is 6 years old! "Ancestor" cars became a front-wheel drive Peugeot 207 RC - Group N base vehicle for amateurs. They look very similar: Design Super 2000 supplemented with only some details, such as rear wing. The machine will be installed engine EW10, the same as the 207 RC, but modified and capable of producing 280 liters. with. He has the ideal design for a given category, and this is his final version. We are aware of the problems of Renault and Fiat, associated with the use of recommended FIA transmissions Sadev, therefore, believe we are fortunate in that we are entering into this competition later: our customers will have less difficulty adapting transmissions. I think the whole thing is a total inadequacy Sadev transmissions for such vehicles. In the FIA ??hopes that Sadev be able to solve these problems in the near future, and we expect to benefit from the experience of other teams! The price - an important factor for the machines in this category, but reliability is more important! Our new machine is completely different from the 307 WRC, although some conceptual aspects are similar. The main factor in the development of a Super 2000 car was the limiting value. Price limits S2000 category are so low that we simply can not be used in constructing technology WRC. - In late 2004, Chairman of the Board of Directors of PSA Group, Mr. Foltz decided to close the program WRC for financial reasons. How serious a Peugeot decided to switch to Super 2000 formula? - We really believe the cost of participation in the WRC Championship too high. Firstly, there are too many steps. Secondly, due to changes in technical regulations we had to spend the extra money for new developments. In the FIA ??knew perfectly well that if not taken timely action to address these challenges, manufacturers will begin to withdraw from the world championship. Adequate measures are not followed, and the result is obvious. Too early to say whether it would be the Super 2000 category correspond to the highest level of world rallying. Naturally, all wondering whether the machine S2000 compete with cars of N. Functionaries of the FIA ??hopes that the cars of these classes will be equivalent to the dynamics, but personally I'm not so sure. Price controls simply do not allow "super" to achieve the characteristics of N. In any case, this is a great chance for many automakers enter into such a wonderful sport as racing. 5-2006 Interviewed by Martin Holmes Photo by the author
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