Eric Camilli continues his apprenticeship

The raw reading of the final ranking of the WRC-2 is not enough. Eric Camilli and Benjamin Veillas, his co-driver, are in eighth place, a somewhat disappointing position considering the potential of the crew. But it does not reflect the performance achieved on the occasion of their second appearance on gravel aboard the Ford Fiesta R5 of the Oreca team. After a cautious start, the duo raised their voice somewhat, going so far as to set the best time in the category in SS 8, to climb to third place in the provisional ranking. But a steering link, subjected to a severe test given the hardness of the tracks taken, gave way immediately, forcing the Nice pilot to resort to the Rally 2 in view of Saturday. Except that this time, it was the dust raised by the competitors racing in front of him which handicapped him, before it was a loss of engine power on Sunday. In these conditions, it is indeed difficult to hope for better than an eighth place, especially since he is still learning the dirt, like driving an all-wheel drive. At least he was able to gain experience on particularly rough terrain, which he had hardly had the opportunity to encounter until then.

This is what the protégé of Toyota Motorsport Gmbh. “We knew how to manage our race by staying clean during the most degraded stages and attacking when the roads allowed it, he declared after arrival. We were in the match, we scored our first scratch on gravel in WRC-2 and we are at the finish. The mission is accomplished. We gain confidence and we gain strength. »

The next challenge for him now is the discovery of the Rally of Finland (July 30-August 2) and the countless bumps negotiated at high speed, which have made its special stages famous.

Find the full report of the Italian rally, produced by our special correspondents in Sardinia, in the 2016 issue of AUTOhebdo, available this evening in digital version, and from this Wednesday on newsstands.