Tour de Corse 1999

The Rally of Corsica brought two novelties into the World Rally Championship. Peugeot introduced the much awaited 206 World Rally Car, and the rally ended for the first time with the TV-stage, televised live in several countries, and also championship points were given to the winners of the stage.

As anticipated, the Citroen Xsaras were again very strong. Philippe Bugalski took control of the race right after the second stage and his team-mate at Citroen, Jesus Puras, now on roads unfamiliar to him, was tailing the Frenchman. The Peugeots demonstrated their full potential already on the first day. The car has been tested excessively and that seemed to pay off; Francois Delecour finished the day in second place, between the Citroens, and Gilles Panizzi was 5th. Toyota was again best of the 'old' teams, Carlos Sainz was 4th, 21 secs behind the leader. Didier Auriol had some problems and was 7th, behind Colin McRae, who won the first stage. Stage 5 was cancelled, again because of excessive crowds on the stage, third time in a row this year.

The new Peugeot 206 WRC (Photo by Peugeot Sport)

Despite their promising start the Peugeots hit problems on the second day. Delecour dropped to 7th with transmission problems and Panizzi retired on tha last stage of the day with a blown engine. The Citroens stayed at the top even though it started to rain on the last two stages of the day. Bugalski was leading by 36 secs but on the wet final stage of the day he took it extra-carefully whereas Puras attacked hard and took more than 30 secs off of Bugalski's advantage. Carlos Sainz tried hard to stay in touch with the Citroens but he lost another 15 secs to them during the day. Colin McRae tried even harder and he was closing in Sainz. Auriol was 5th and Subaru's Richard Burns 6th. Tommi Makinen on the 8th position continued to suffer from brake problems he had already on the first day.

Puras started the final day with the win in his sight but on the third stage of the day the Citroen Team told him to freeze the situation and let Bugalski take the win as the Tour de Corse is also a part of the French Rally Championship. The Citroens had no trouble keeping their positions and again the best points went to drivers not competing in the WRC. Colin McRae managed to pass Carlos Sainz before the final 'TV-stage', but on front of the live TV-audience his gearbox jammed causing a slight off and a puncture. Colin didn't lose more than 10 secs and kept fourth place in the competition.

The extra points from the last stage went to Auriol (3 points) who won Tommi Makinen (2 points) by 2 secs. Makinen again had a good final day, passing Richard Burns who spun a few times and Francois Delecour who retired on the last stage with broken transmmission. Thus, Auriol scored five points by finishing 5th and winning the last stage and Makinen got the total of three points. Carlos Sainz finished the rally on 3rd place and was also third on the last stage, so he got 6 points. Auriol's performance is a bit of a surprise this year, he is now only one point behind Makinen, still the championship leader.

Richard Burns finished the rally as the leading Subaru in 7th place, followed by Freddy Loix. The Seats had a hard time all through the event with the setups of the cars, Liatti finished 9th.