World Rally Championship 2015 begins this week in Monte Carlo. The legendary event will also see the return of Sébastien Loeb and this is by far the most interesting aspect of this year's event. For the first time after a long time we will have two drivers in a same rally who have won the title. Ogier, the only regular title-winning driver of WRC in 2015, will surely see Loeb's challenge as an extra motivation to win, given their tense relationship at Citroën in 2011.
Volkswagen Polo WRC is clearly the best car of WRC, but the changing conditions of Monte Carlo will level the playingfield. One tyre choise gone wrong can drop a driver from the lead to 8th. The conditions can change during one stage from dry asphalt to snow and propably for the most of the time drivers are on wrong tyres. One must drive with caution and thinking, flat out approach will lead into trouble. One right tyrechoise can also put a drive up on the leaderboard, as for example François Delecour showed in 2011, when Monte was a non-WRC event. The changing conditions and stages at night make Monte Carlo an event which is takes us closer to the old days of rallying when events were long and stages at night were a regular challenge to face.
Besides the French Sébastiens, one can expect to see good preformances from Hyundai-duo Thierry Neuville (although Monte isn't his favourite event) and Dani Sordo (especially if most of the stages are dry asphalt), Brian Bouffier (Ford) and Chris Meeke of Citroën (3rd last year). For Jari-Matti Latvala this is an event in which he should consentrate on finishing in the points, since he is propably the only real challenger for Ogier this year, although the running order regulation will level the playingfield for cars behind Volkswagens.
One to watch is the French legend Delecour, who will participate this year's Monte with Porsche 997 RGT in his own class, and is surely spectacular to watch - and listen in post-stage interviews.
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