05/09/2021
Travis Pastrana and Rhianon Gelsomino win North American Rally Championship with Yokohama!
This years North American Rally Championship is undoubtedly dominated by Travis Pastrana and Rhianon Gelsomino. The pair, driving a Subaru WRX STI, prepared by Subaru Motorsports USA / Vermont SportsCar, have won 4 out of 6 this years rounds. With two rounds still to go, the gap in points is too big for others to catch.
Although rallying isn’t maybe the most popular of sports in the United States, the competition is strong and the popularity grows very very quickly. Most of the honours for this go of course to Travis Pastrana and Ken Block, the names who every kid knows.
The cars in North American Rally Championship are no joke either. The series has drivers like Barry McKenna with a Fiesta WRC, David Higgins with a modified Fiesta S2000 Turbo and many latest R5 cars. While you can’t see Subarus driving here in the WRC category, the rules in United States are giving some more freedom. The Subaru which Pastrana used is built like a proper rally car, modified from the original chassis where needed. It’s not easy going against the WRC car.
The tyre choice in the series is free. You could pick everything, from Cooper to Michelin to Pirelli, whatever you’d like. That is where we can see which tyre really works, and which don’t.
How do you win with a Subaru against one of the best drivers in America with a WRC car with Michelin’s? With Yokohama of course..
