MOTOR SPORT Champion Breen returns for Series Opener in Turkey

2009 Fiesta Sport Trophy International Champion Craig Breen will make his first World Rally Championship appearance of this season next weekend as he makes the trip to Istanbul for World Rally Turkey, the fourth round in the world series and the opening round of the Fiesta Sport Trophy International Championship.

Craig will revert back to the Ford Fiesta ST model which took him to championship glory last season in this one off outing. The event comes at an ideal time after having to non finishes over the last two weekends in the Bulldog International and Circuit of Ireland. So with no pressure Craig will be able to relax and enjoy the experience. He will run as a Castrol Team Turkiye entrant with a Turkish service crew. The opportunity came about when Serdar Bostanci had a GpN Fiesta ST for hire and, on mentioning this to Craig; he jumped at the chance and a deal was ironed out. Castrol Team Turkiye are run by Teknik Motorsport and supported by Ford of Turkey.

Craig "I'm really looking forward to getting back behind the wheel of the Fiesta ST again after a long absence. Since winning the FSTi Shootout, I have enjoyed three months of working with the Ford World Rally Team, thanks to Malcolm Wilson and his experienced team of staff at M-Sport. This rally is a bit of fun, as well as an exercise in learning the stages so that we can return next year in our S2000 Fiesta. That said, I am looking forward to the competition from the rest of the FSTi field, it should be an exciting rally."

The 2010 Fiesta Sport Trophy International (FSTi) series gets underway next week as the competition joins the FIA World Rally Championship (WRC) for the fifth successive year, kicking off with the first of seven rounds at the Rally of Turkey. This will be the second time that FSTi has visited Turkey, the last time being in 2008, which proved to be a real challenge for the FSTi drivers.

The series, run by M-Sport with support from Pirelli, will again run alongside the WRC, taking in the Vodafone Rally de Portugal, Neste Oil Rally Finland, ADAC Rallye Deutschland, the new Alsace-based Rallye de France, Rally de Espaٌa and, finally, the Rally of Great Britain.

Since its introduction to the championship in 2003, the Rally of Turkey has been known for its rough gravel roads in the country's southwest region near Antalya, but the location of this year's rally has moved to Istanbul, the only city in the world to span two continents (Europe and Asia), where the 358km of stages promise to be wider, smoother and faster. The rally organisers have also chosen to take advantage of a new FIA regulation for 2010 permitting mixed surface events, so the predominantly gravel route contains almost 50km of asphalt, which will concentrate the minds of any drivers not local to the region.