Breen Ready for Brace of Baltic Rallies

After recently tackling three tarmac rallies, Craig Breen will now turn his attention to the gravel stages of Rally Estonia, which will serve as a test session in preparation for the third round of the FIA WRC Academy; Rally Finland.

Rally Estonia is a two day event that takes place on Friday 15th and Saturday 16th of July and is based in the City of Otepaa. Breen, along with seven of his peers from the WRC Academy, will do battle on the 162 competitive kms which are spread over nine special stages.

All competitors will get a chance to fine tune their set-up over a shakedown stage on Thursday the 14th. The rally action will begin with a ceremonial start from the Otepaa Tehvandi Ski Stadium on Friday afternoon, Day one takes in the opening gravel test (18.4 km) and the Otepaa City stage (5.3km) which is tackled twice. Day two consists of a double loop of three gravel stages with each loop covering 66.6kms.

The WRC Academy reaches the half-way point when competitors head to Jvaskyla to take on the legendary crests and high speed special stages of Rally Finland and Breen is in confident form following a start to finish victory on his recent home tarmac rally, "The Ravens Rock Rally", based in Kilkenny, Ireland, Craig choosing to dust off the cobwebs' from his Ford Fiesta S2000 for the occasion but will be back in his Ford Fiesta R2 as he gears up for the Rally Finland.

Rally Estonia is characterised by typically fast Baltic gravel stages and this region of northern Europe will prove a key testing ground before the WRC Academy drivers make the trip to Finland. Egon Kaur, who leads the WRC Academy after winning the first two rounds of the six round series, will be on home ground and Craig will also have to contend with the likes of Alastair Fisher and Molly Taylor. Craig is currently trying to find the best set-up for his bucket and spade whilst on holiday in the Algarve but he is looking forward to the challenges that lie ahead in the next month.

Craig; "My goal is to get some competitive mileage in Estonia before Rally Finland and to get a good setup so when we go to Finland we will be quick from the word go. It will be interesting to compare myself against other drivers in the WRC Academy. I'm really looking forward to it".