The team principal of M-Sport Ford, Richard Millener, says that Adrien Fourmaux looks like a professional athlete now and admires his consistency despite his lack of results in 2022.
M-Sport Ford offered to Fourmaux a full-time contract for 2022, but he was forced to skip Acropolis Rally due to a heavy crash he had at Ypres Rally and generally had four crashes during that season, thus the British team preferred Ott Tanak and Pierre-Louis Loubet over him in 2023. The Frenchman competed with the Ford Fiesta MKII Rally2 in WRC2 class and the British Rally Championship last year having the support of M-Sport Ford where he managed to become the first driver from France who became a Champion at BRC. In addition to this achievement, he topped the overall classification at Central European Rally on his category, but he was not the winner of CER in 2023 as he participated as a non-nominated driver. In 2024, he returned back to the top class as the leading driver of M-Sport Ford and claimed his maiden WRC podium in Sweden three months ago while he finished at the lowest place of the podium in Kenya which means that he had two podium finishes in two rallies in a row. Last but not least, he took his first Powerstage win in his career at Croatia Rally and is now more capable to fight against the most experienced and talented drivers in the world, such as Dani Sordo and Elfyn Evans.
"Everything’s come together at once for Adrien", Millener said.
"He just looks like the finished article now.
"When you look at him now, he just looks like a professional athlete.
"He’s been working out in the gym.
"He’s confident, he’s smart, he’s professional.
"He’s doing great.
"There’s still a lot to go and we’re at the early part of the season and there will be some tough times, I’m sure.
"But his ability to balance himself over the event and pick and choose his battles and have a really sensible approach to things… it’s really great to watch.
"I’ve seen all the hard times he’s had and now he’s really at the top of his game at the moment.
"Everything was kind of coming together for him last year – in terms of being able to deal with pressure and deal with situations and be very focused on how to approach a rally and be consistent across the whole event.
"And if there was a problem or a puncture or something went wrong, it wasn’t an emotional reaction.
"It was a more measured approach: right that’s done, now we’ve got to react, alter our plan slightly, drive accordingly.
"And then you came to this year and every rally I’ve seen him it’s just his performance is consistent.
"It isn’t going up and down throughout the rally, it’s not like a couple of good stages, a couple of horrendous stages, it is consistently very impressive.
"But something has clicked for him, he’s able to fight with the other guys now.
"Adrien is now considered as somebody who can fight with everybody – he’s coming to rallies to fight for a podium rather than to get a fifth or sixth place".
Source: DirtFish.com
Photo Credits: M-Sport
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