Swedish rally star Ramona Karlsson will replace Jacques Villeneuve in an Albatec Racing Peugeot 208 at round nine of the FIA World Rallycross Championship presented by Monster Energy. The first female to enter World RX after contesting World RX of Portugal at the start of the season, Karlsson will join British driver Andy Scott in Buxtehude (Germany) over the weekend of 20-21 September.
Karlsson took part in the opening rounds of Euro RX in a Saab 9-3, but now joins Albatec Racing at the wheel of a 600bhp Peugeot 208 Supercar in a bid to break into the semi-final positions. The talented Swede will join the team at a test session at Mayenne in France immediately prior to Lohéac.
Andy Scott commented: “I’m very excited to see Ramona in the team, as I believe she has a lot of potential both in the car and out. She comes into rallycross with a huge amount of experience across rallying and rallycross, and she will I’m sure be an asset to the team. In our dealings with her so far, she has been incredibly professional and a pleasure to work with. I look forward to welcoming her into the Albatec family where we are determined to provide her with the tools to help her achieve her goal of reaching the semi finals.â€
Karlsson concluded: “The co-operation with Albatec was very recently settled, and I’m extremely excited to be joining them. I have watched the team with interest all season, having had communications with them before the start of the year, and I’ve been incredibly impressed by their professionalism, their attention to detail, and their enthusiasm. I look forward to working with their engineers and mechanics to help develop the 208 into an outright race-winning car. I hope we have a good test and I get a good feeling for the car, I think it will be a big difference from the Saab, but I will really take the opportunity to soak up all I can. I’m really looking forward to Germany and my goal is to reach the semi finals.â€
