Neuville praised following strong start

Kronos Racing boss Marc van Dalen has praised Thierry Neuville following the opening loop of three stages on Rally Islas Canarias El Corte Inglés this afternoon.

Driving a Team Peugeot Belgium-Luxembourg 207 Super 2000, Neuville is just 0.4s adrift of leader, last year’s winner Jan Kopecký in a Škoda Fabia Super 2000.

“I am very happy with that performance,” said van Dalen. “He did some tests with Peugeot Sport and everything just clicked for him. Honestly I always believed he could do this but it’s good he has proved that he can be fast.”

Despite his impressive start to the Intercontinental Rally Challenge event, van Dalen said there would be no change to Neuville’s pre-rally strategy.

“There is a long way to go and he knows the objective is to get the maximum number of points possible and that means he has to finish,” said van Dalen.

Van Dalen’s other driver, the Peugeot UK-backed Guy Wilks, is fifth overall after going fastest on two of the three stages run so far.

“The car was moving around too much on the second stage, really sliding at the rear, and I lost some confidence in the fast stuff because of this,” said Wilks. “We changed the damper clicks for the next one and it worked really well.”