Petter Solberg slo til med ny bakkerekord i Målselv da han besøkte Norges råeste bakkeløp på sin Farewell Tour. Les pressemelding på engelsk her:
Three-time FIA World Champion Petter Solberg settled a bet made over the breakfast table in Måselv today (Saturday).
Last year his son Oliver set a new record for the Norges Råeste Bakkeløp, Norway’s most famous hillclimb.
Petter said he could beat that time.
Oliver said he couldn’t.
Guess what? Petter won.
His time of 1m37.99s will take some beating after Petter wound Volkswagen Motorsport’s Polo R Supercar up and tore up the 3.75km road. But as well as his blistering pace, this event has also been about a trip down another road for Petter: memory lane.
Petter joked: “Oliver needs to wake up earlier each morning if he’s going to win this one back!”
In addition to the hillclimb, the Norges Råeste Bakkeløp included a variety of events including gymkhana, a drag race and autocross. Petter won the gymkhana and autocross, but lost out to a 1100bhp drag car in a straight line.
The organisers have extended the hillclimb from Oliver’s record-breaking run last year, but they permitted Petter one shot at the old course before they changed the course for the race proper. Petter took that shot and scored, bettering his son’s time by six seconds (albeit in a faster car with more power than the Citroën Xsara WRC Oliver used in 2018).
Petter added: “This is a fantastic event and it’s the sort of thing I began my career competing in. That’s why I wanted to bring back some people who helped me race when I was starting out in the 1990s. This was a really nice reunion with the mechanics and guys.
“I brought back my Volvo 240. My family and me, we built this car ourselves, completely. I’m still so proud of it – and it’s still one incredible machine. In 1995 I won 19 out of 21 Norwegian rallycross races in that car and it still gave me a real buzz to drive it in the gymkhana event on Wednesday. I didn’t drive that car for 20 years, it’s still on the same tyres it was the last time I drove it and we won!
“Finally I want to say a big thank you to the organisers of the event – and a lot of congratulations. These guys worked so hard and I think they have a big future and a really promising future for an exciting event.”
Petter Solberg’s Farewell Tour in full:
Goodwood Festival of Speed
Location: Great Britain
Date: July 4-7
Norges Råeste Bakkeløp
Location: Norway
Date: July 17-20
Gymkhana GRiD
Location: Poland
Date: September 7
Car: It’ll have a good handbrake…
“This is definitely one of the coolest events in motorsport now. Ken Block and Monster Energy have made an incredible job of bringing this drifting side of the sport to the people. I won this event before and came really close to winning last year when Johan [Kristoffersson] beat me.
“But I also came really close to being beaten by my son Oliver – he was driving our [Citroën] Xsara in South Africa last year and if it wasn’t for an engine problem he might have beaten me. It’s actually a really tricky event, you have to focus and concentrate so hard – if you run even a couple of centimetres wide then you can lose your race. It’s intense, but seriously good fun as well.”
*Petter will still compete regularly, but the focus will be on fun rather than winning. Focus on fun rather than winning. Did we even say that? The focus will forever be on winning…