Tom Williams will commence his 2019 FIA Junior World Rally Championship campaign on the most specialised event of the year, when the only British driver in the series takes on the challenging high-speed snow and ice stages of Rally Sweden (14-17 February).
Co-driven by Phil Hall, the 20-year old Oxfordshire driver contested Rally Sweden for the first time last year, finishing 10th JWRC and 49th overall on his JWRC, and Scandinavian winter rally, debut.
In preparation for his return, Tom contested the famous Arctic Lapland Rally – which took place in the frozen forests near Rovaniemi in Finland. It was a great opportunity to reacclimatise with driving on studded spiked Pirelli tyres, although it was so cold that all the plastic in the engine bay of his hired Fiesta R2 froze and cracked, limiting the amount of running he was able to do.
Straight after that, Tom travelled to Norway to test the brand new M-Sport developed EcoBoost-powered Ford Fiesta R2 – the car which all JWRC competitors will drive in 2019. Tom successfully completed around 250kms in the car, with the seat time allowing him to familiarise himself with the more powerful two-wheel drive machine, hone his driving skills on snow and ice and to experiment with the vital set-up options which he can now employ on Rally Sweden.
Tom has also been to Paris, to represent Richard Burns (alongside Burns’ sister Jo and former co-driver Robert Reid) at a ceremony where 17 different World Rally Champions were inducted into the FIA Hall of Fame. Burns, the 2001 World Rally Champion, was a close family friend and Tom, who is Burns’ Godson, spent the evening talking to the likes of Carlos Sainz, Petter Solberg and Tommi Mäkinen at the invitation-only event – and picking up valuable tips ahead of the JWRC season!
Tom Williams said: “We’re going to Rally Sweden looking for a clean run and a strong start to the FIA Junior World Rally Championship. There are only five rounds of the JWRC, so it’s important to finish them all – and to finish them well, so we’ll be aiming to improve our results in this my second year in the series.
“Sweden is a tricky start to the season as it’s such a specialised event and we’ll be competing against a lot of Scandinavian drivers who have a lot more experience of rallying on snow and ice. In preparation for this, I did the Arctic Lapland Rally in an old Fiesta R2. It was good practice, even though the conditions were a lot more severe than they’ll be in central Sweden and the freezing temperature caused issues with the car and we didn’t do as many kilometres as we had hoped.
“We did a lot more kilometres on the official JWRC test we did at the John Haugland Winter Rally School in Norway immediately after the Arctic Rally. There we did around 250kms on snow and ice in the all-new M-Sport Ford Fiesta R2, which really is an amazing machine. As well and the increase in speed and performance, there is also a lot more you can do to the new Fiesta R2 in terms of set-up, so we worked hard on altering and logging different settings for the different conditions we might face at Rally Sweden.
“With the Rally Sweden route identical to last year, and with a good winter test under my belt, I’m really looking forward to the opening JWRC round. The event will be a big challenge, especially as the new Fiesta R2 will make the JWRC competition even more intense in 2019, yet I feel very well prepared for what should be an incredible season.”
Rally Sweden begins on Thursday 14 February with a night time 1.9km super special stage around a trotting track in Karlstad, which is located in the Värmland county of Sweden. Friday (15 February) is a much longer day totalling 91.27kms of stages, with three snow-covered forest tests in Norway, followed by the first run over the Torsby stage, close to the centralised service area. Saturday (16 February) is the longest day of the event, featuring 126.18kms of stages on the classic Swedish roads near Hagfors, with three long stages tackled twice, followed by a repeat of the Karlstad super special stage and a blast through the Torsby Sprint stage. The final day of competition on Sunday (17 February) sees two passes over the 21.19km Likenäs test, followed by the live TV 8.93km Power Stage in Torsby. In total, there are 19 stages, covering 319.17kms.