Andreas Mikkelsen an asphalt star

Škoda UK Motorsport driver Andreas Mikkelsen isn’t fazed by the unusually high ratio of asphalt to gravel rallies in this year’s revised Intercontinental Rally Challenge calendar, for he has contested many sealed surface events and likes competing on Tarmac very much.

There was to be a gravel rally in Argentina, but the Rally de los Alerces, originally due to form Round 2 of the series, has been replaced by the all-asphalt Rally Islas Canarias El Corte Ingles. Meanwhile the Mecsek Rallye in Hungary will now take place on asphalt stages only, having originally been set to use a combination of asphalt and gravel tests.

These changes leave only three gravel rallies in the 2011 IRC – Azores in July and the final two events in Scotland and Cyprus in October and November – and nine rallies on asphalt.

“In an ideal world, you’d have a fifty-fifty split of gravel and asphalt rallies, and a snow rally in the calendar too, but for me three gravel and nine asphalt rallies is okay,” says Andreas.

“I learnt a lot about asphalt rallies when I did rounds of the Irish Tarmac Championship in 2007, and since then I’ve had some good results on asphalt in both the IRC and WRC.”

These include a WRC points-scoring 8th on the 2008 Rally de España, an outright win on the 2009 Rally Costa Brava, 3rd on the 2009 Rally Bohemia and 5th overall on the 2010 Geko Ypres Rally and Barum Czech Rally Zlín.

In another change to the originally announced 2011 IRC calendar, the Tour de Corse has moved back one week to 13-15 May.

2011 IRC calendar:
18-22 January…. Rallye Monte Carlo
14-16 April… Rally Islas Canarias El Corte Ingles
13-15 May… Tour de Corse
02-04 June…Prime Yalta Rally (Ukraine)
23-25 June…Geko Ypres Rally (Belgium)
14-16 July… Sata Rallye Acores
04-06 August…Rali Vinho Madeira
26-28 August…Czech Rally Zlin
09-11 September…Mecsek Rallye (Hungary)
22-24 September…Rallye Sanremo (Italy)
14-16 October…RACMSA Rally of Scotland
03-05 November…Cyprus Rally
– Credit: SkodaUK Motorsport.