Loeb with an evolved Peugeot 306 Maxi at the Rallye du Var

Sébastien Loeb will participate in Rally du Var from November 23 to 26 by piloting its Peugeot 306 Maxi which will have been reworked by the team bearing the name of the nine-time champion of WRC.

The Sébastien Loeb Racing mechanics took the time to dismantle the Lioness to give it a slimming treatment. After more than 300 hours of work, largely on the chassis, the men of Sébastien Loeb Racing are preparing to reassemble the kit-car for future tests.

“I’m really looking forward to getting back behind the wheel, enthuses Sébastien Loeb. With its furious naturally aspirated engine and its virile side, it was already particularly exhilarating to drive, but thus optimized, it should be even more efficient. »

“I had the opportunity to follow the team's work step by step, and I must recognize that they put a lot of heart into the work, to make it a true piece of goldsmith's work. Well done to them! It is now up to me to reward them with a great result in the Maures massif, even if the objective, on these magnificent roads, will be above all to have fun in front of a crowd always present in large numbers”, adds the Alsatian.

“We had a good base, details Jean-Philippe Nicolao, the technical manager of Sébastien Loeb Racing, but we still wanted to refine it to bring it up to our standards. So we approached the specialists in the field, Patrice Marguet from Pam Sport, who bought the entire stock of period parts, Matter for the chassis, Vaison Sport obviously too, without forgetting the Enjolras family for the adjustments part. »

“Based on a new chassis hydro-blasted in order to save weight and finish quality, we carried out a lot of work on the welds. We also removed excess grams from the sheet metal, particularly on the front fenders which we completely stripped of their putty before reforming them with a hammer,” adds Jean-Philippe Nicolao.

“No detail has been neglected, including the optimization of the heating unit, the headlight strip, the battery switched to lithium-ion, the seats manufactured by Sparco, or even the electrical harness, which has been completely redone . This is the first time that we have truly prepared a car from A to Z, but I believe that we have successfully met the challenge: it clearly illustrates our attention to detail and will be our showcase! », underlines the technical manager of SLR.