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Henk Lategan and Barry White battled the rain and inclement conditions at the Sasol Rally in Nelspruit over 19-20 April to claim a fourth place overall for the South African Volkswagen Sasolracing rally team. Even with multiple punctures, the duo were the top-placed VW finishers in their Polo S2000. Two of the 15 stages on the two-day event were cancelled, with the second day having almost constant rain. The wet conditions didn’t stop Gugu Zulu and Carl Peskin either, their Polo Vivo S2000 finishing seventh, the reigning S2000 Challenge champions taking the honours once more in the category.

‘It was an unpredictable rally and today was particularly tough,’ said Lategan. ‘It was difficult just staying on the road and we found ourselves going full-lock in both directions on the straights. The most important thing was for us was to get to the finish of the event.’ Mike Rowe, Head of Volkswagen Motorsport South Africa agreed. ‘The Sasol Rally proved a real challenge this year. Henk and Barry did well in just their second outing for the Volkswagen Sasolracing team. They put in a good performance and even recorded a stage win in the process.’

The Sasol Rally was the first outing for the new pairing of Enzo Kuun and Douglas Judd, following the retirement of Kuun’s longstanding co-driver Guy Hodgson. Not expected to be competitive, the pair didn’t finish the event. An opportunity to get some time together in the car, the pair achieved their goal, according to Rowe. Finally, Hergen Fekken and Pierre Arries put in good stage times on the second day of the event, claiming several stage times within the top five finishers. Technical problems during the first day of the event cost them in terms of overall rally time and they finished just inside the top 10, claiming ninth place overall.

It looked as though it may not happen, but Sébastien Ogier and Julien Ingrassia were once again victorious in the 2013 FIA World Rally Championship yesterday, lifting the trophy at Rally Portugal. The third win of the season for Volkswagen Motorsport, Ogier was recovering from the end of flu at the start of the event, and took victory ahead of Citroën’s Mikko Hirvonen and Polo R WRC team-mates Jari-Matti Latvala and Miikka Anttila, who celebrated their first podium finish of 2013. The third Polo R WRC driver, Andreas Mikkelsen, made a promising start to his Volkswagen career, coming in sixth with his co-driver Mikko Markkula. With points scored at the fourth event of 2013, Volkswagen now sits at the top of the FIA World Rally Championship manufacturer’s table. Ogier heads the drivers.

Despite his illness, Ogier performed well, right from the start, emerging with a slender lead at the end of day one. Four stage wins on Saturday retained his grip on the lead, a lead he held until the finish of the event on Sunday. But, his drive wasn’t without problems. Both he and Latvala suffered mechanical failures on the final day of the event. Ogier’s connecter between the front and rear axles (which allows the handbrake to be used in tight hairpins) refused to close, losing him time, while one of Latvala’s driveshafts broke, causing him to tackle the longest stage of the event – the 52.30km Almodovar stage – with just rear-wheel drive. He ultimately surrendered his then-second place, but still drove superbly enough to finish in third place overall.

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Volkswagen has enjoyed another good month for sales, as both the Polo and Golf remained in the top 10 best-selling cars in the UK during March 2013. Racking up sales of 7,431 units, the small VW sat consistently in seventh place, the same position in February’s chart. Its larger brother – now with its seventh generation fully established on the UK market – was placed three places higher in fourth, with 9978 sales recorded. The Ford Fiesta continued its reign at the top of the chart, selling 22,748 examples with the arrival of the new ’13’ registration plate.

UK car registrations rose for a 13th consecutive month in March, up 5.9 per cent to 394,806 units. The supermini segment once again showed the strongest growth, up 56.6 per cent, attributable to the success of newly-introduced models. ‘Despite ongoing economic concerns, consistent monthly growth in the market is an encouraging sign of returning consumer confidence as motorists are attracted to forecourts by new models and the latest technologies,’ said SMMT Interim Chief Executive, Mike Baunton. The UK’s top 10 best-selling cars during March 2013 and the year-to-date (sales figure and position in brackets) are as follows:

1 Ford Fiesta: 22,748 (34,309, 1st)

2 Vauxhall Corsa: 16,169 (24,561, 3rd)

3 Ford Focus: 15,434 (25,081, 2nd)
4 Volkswagen Golf: 9978 (15,726, 5th)

5 Vauxhall Astra: 9559 (17,202, 4th)

6 Nissan Qashqai: 8465 (14,601, 6th)

7 Volkswagen Polo: 7431 (11,753, 7th)

8 BMW 1 Series: 7001

9 Peugeot 208: 6726 (11,108, 8th)

10 Mercedes-Benz C-Class: 6628 (10,301, 9th)


(The 2013 top 10 best-selling car absent from last month’s sales figures is the Nissan Juke in 10th place with 10,010 units sold.)

Volkswagen Group South Africa retains its leadership position in the passenger car market, as once again the Polo Vivo has been named as the best-selling passenger car in the country during March 2013, while the Polo dutifully supports it in second place, with sales of 2939 and 2596 respectively. Volkswagen Group South Africa sold a total of 8516 units last month, translating to a market share of 22.8 per cent. Overall, 37,596 new passenger cars were sold in South Africa during the same period.

The Polo Vivo was launched in March 2010 as an entry-level model for the South African market, replacing the Series 1 Golf-based CitiGolf, and is available as a three or five-door hatchback and four-door booted saloon with 74bhp/84bhp 1.4-litre and 103bhp 1.6-litre petrol engines. Costing from R111,900 for the base-model 1.4 hatchback to R161,100 for the top 1.6 Polo Maxx, the 2013 Polo Vivo is based on the revised version of the Series 4 Polo (9N3), built from 2005 to 2009. The fifth-generation Polo (6R) is available as both a three and five-door hatchback, in addition to the four-door Polo Sedan.

The fourth round of the 2013 FIA World Rally Championship will see three Polo R WRCs take to the start line for the first time. Sébastien Ogier and Jari-Matti Latvala are joined for the rest of season by Intercontinental Rally Challenge champion Andreas Mikkelsen from Rally Portugal onwards. Along with his co-driver Mikko Markkula, Mikkselsen will contest events in the number 9 Volkswagen Motorsport car, and represent a theoretically second team – Volkswagen Motorsport II, which will allow the Norwegian/Finnish duo to have access to ten test days this year, rather than having to share this limited development time with their team-mates.

Testing has already taken place on the Algarve coast, with each crew spending two days putting the rally Polos through their paces at the end of March. The second gravel event of the year, the Rally Portugal from 11-14 April will see 386.73 kilometres driven over the course of 15 special stages. Mikkelsen has already had his first taste of WRC action in Portugal, as he took part in the Fafe Rally Sprint at the weekend, a 6.34km event in the north of the country. Finishing in fourth place, he and Markkula tailed the Citroën DS3 of Dani Sordo and Carlos del Barrio, at the 10,000-spectator strong event. Ogier also was due to compete at the Fafe Rally Sprint, but was forced to withdraw due to suffering from a bout of flu.

‘After three completely different rallies at the start of the season, the first “typical” WRC rally awaits us in Portugal,’ said Volkswagen Motorsport Director Jost Capito. ‘Tough gravel routes, spring temperatures and – unlike at the Rally Mexico – stages at just above sea level: we will probably come across the same kind of conditions at the coming rallies in Argentina, Greece and Italy. As such, the Rally Portugal provides us with another important indicator of what the Polo R WRC is capable of. Furthermore, we will also send a third driving pair into action at every rally from now on, in the form of Andreas Mikkelsen and Mikko Markkula. Andreas and Mikko have already been very successful in the Intercontinental Rally Challenge, and are now deservedly taking the next big step into the top flight of rallying.’