In the latest episode of the More than machine documentary series, which follows M-Sport Ford’s journey in the WRC, it was revealed that the team’s top driver, Adrien Fourmaux, has received offers from two other WRC teams.
In the episode, Fourmaux openly admits he has offers on the table from Toyota and Hyundai — a partial-season proposal from Toyota and a full-season contract from Hyundai.
The Hyundai offer is not particularly surprising, as the Frenchman has been rumoured to join the Korean team since the summer. However, the Toyota offer was big news for most, especially considering that Toyota’s team principal Jari-Matti Latvala has stated the Japanese team is not in serious talks with the French driver. Furthermore, it has been widely assumed that Toyota would compete next season with a line-up similar to this year’s.
Fourmaux did note in the documentary that he is not interested in Toyota’s partial-season deal. This leaves him with two options: staying with M-Sport or making the leap to Hyundai.
“He hasn’t decided which one and we haven’t announced yet which one,” M-Sport team principal Richard Millener told RallyJournal.com.
“My goal is still to ensure he retains the team with us,” Millener added.
Although the documentary portrays events almost uncomfortably directly, Millener believes it is valuable for fans to witness such “real-life drama.”
“But I think it’s important to see the discussions that a driver needs to consider in this. You know, whenever we talk about drivers swapping teams, we talk about what the team’s going to do and the team’s line-up. We don’t really concentrate on what the driver is feeling and what they want to do in their own professional life as well,” Millener reflected.
Millener admitted he had reservations about whether such insights should be shared with fans.
“I think it’s really key to tell all these different sides of the story. It’s not always easy, and, like I say, it’s difficult to watch these edits and sometimes think, “Are we okay to put that out there?” because it’s very different. But I think it’s been a really exciting opportunity to be able to do it in such a professional and well-edited way,” Millener explained.
Millener hopes that similar stories will be featured more frequently in the WRC in the future.
“I think, and I hope, that the goal of this series is to open up the bigger stories in WRC and that it gets expanded across all the teams, because we want to see this across the whole championship, not just M-Sport.”
