Ole Christian Veiby was pleased to sign off a ‘frustrating’
season in the FIA World Rallycross Championship with a podium finish on the final
day in Hong Kong earlier this month, as he helped Volkswagen Dealerteam BAUHAUS
to secure the Teams’ title for the second consecutive year.
After placing fourth in the Drivers’ standings
in 2022 – his maiden full campaign in the series – Veiby had designs on the
runner-up spoils in 2023, but just a single rostrum appearance from the opening
five rounds heading to Hong Kong dealt his chances a hefty blow.
The Norwegian was nonetheless rapid from the
outset around the Central Harbourfront circuit – the first downtown venue in
World RX history – and set the pace in qualifying practice on the Saturday morning
to the tune of more than three tenths-of-a-second. Track evolution, however, meant
he was then in the slower race in heat one, restricting him to sixth position
overall.
Putting his extensive rallying background to
good use to read the road, Veiby survived an attack from Timmy Hansen at the
start of heat two to win the race and climb to fourth in the intermediate classification.
He took the chequered flag second in his semi-final behind Niclas Grönholm, and
looked set to repeat that result in the final until he lost out to the flying Finn
and Timo Scheider in the closing stages.
The 27-year-old ran wide at the beginning of
heat one the next day and thereafter struggled for speed, but held his own in a
battle of the big guns in heat two. He then threw his ZEROID X1 boldly around
the outside of his adversaries from the far side of the grid in heat three,
going on to grab the second-quickest time of the session after Grönholm suddenly
and unexpectedly slowed exiting the last corner.
Veiby was evenly-matched with the CE Dealer Team
driver once again in the pair’s semi-final, before advancing to second at the
start of the final and remaining there throughout, equalling his career-best finish
and leapfrogging the elder Hansen brother to snatch fifth spot in the
championship table.
“It’s been a frustrating season
and it was frustrating again on the first day [in Hong Kong], but Sunday could
not have gone better,” the Kongsvinger native reflected. “It was great to
finish on a high.
“I ended up in the second race in both heats on
Saturday and the track got so much worse with each race, which made it impossible
to set good times. That clearly wasn’t
the result we were after, but at least we secured the Teams’ championship.
“After such a tough season, it felt great to be
back on the podium in the last round with a one-two for the team in front of an
awesome crowd – that was fantastic. Our goal had been to finish on a high and
for me to seal a top five place in the championship standings, so it was
mission accomplished – big thanks to
the team for everybody’s hard work this year.”
Finland
Italy
Hungary