PALLETFORCE

The Rally Team Scotland crew of John MacCrone and Stuart Loudon will embark on one of their biggest motorsport challenges as they tackle an FIA World Rally Championship event for the first time this weekend.

ADAC Rallye Deutschland, based at Trier in western Germany, heralds the ninth round of the world series and will see MacCrone and Loudon take to the stages in their world rally debut alongside the world’s top rally drivers.

But the pair are both members of MSA's Team UK, a driver development scheme for the country's most promising young drivers, and are focused on using their specialised training to make the most of the opportunity.

Although all of Rallye Deutschland's 19 competitive stages take place on asphalt, the route takes crews through some very different regions – each demanding different skills from MacCrone. As the first asphalt rally in this year's championship there’s also a huge amount of expectation to see which drivers and cars will be battling for victory.

Friday's action is centered around the vineyards of the Mosel valley and the fast, narrow roads are littered with low walls and slippery junctions to catch out the unwary – but the pair's nimble Palletforce-backed Fiesta R2 could well be suited to the winding vineyard lanes.

When the rally moves to the Baumholder military training ranges on day two, crews will face demanding sections of fast, broken asphalt lined with giant hinkelsteins – more used to keeping tanks on the road. The Tunnock's-supported crew's baptism of fire continues on Sunday's final day stages through vineyards and more traditional German countryside.

The rally finishes with a leisurely blast through the streets of Trier and around the famous Porta Nigra, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, where crews lucky enough to make the finish will have completed over 360 competitive kilometres.

Rally Team Scotland has been working tirelessly behind the scenes to bring more team partners on board and to secure more high-class events. German businesses A2B-Online and Schubert Packaging join Auto Glym and Unique ID as four new team partners – and MacCrone is hoping he can deliver a strong performance for them on his world class debut.

Rally Team Scotland driver John MacCrone said: "I'm really excited about this opportunity and realise the benefit of having three full days of competition – with that in mind, my focus is definitely to try and finish the rally and make best use of the experience. The rally has thrown up a lot of challenges in the past and, if the weather is mixed this weekend, it will be difficult to master the changing surfaces."