Hyundai celebrates the titles and victories won during the 2022 season and kicks off 2023, a year in which everyone goes out to win again.
Hyundai has brought together the Spanish drivers who achieved success in competition with the brand, both inside and outside our borders, during the past 2022, and who will compete with them this season. From the circuits, where Mikel Azcona became the first Spaniard to win the World Touring Car Championship, to the World Rally Championship or the National event.
Accompanied by the Secretary of State for Sport, José Manuel Franco, and by the President of the Royal Automobile Federation, Manuel Aviñó, Hyundai has celebrated the sporting successes of 2022 and has kicked off the 2023 season. One more year, the Korean brand will be involved in several contests, and the objectives are no less ambitious.
At the wheel of a Hyundai Elantra N TCR, Mikel Azcona became the first Spaniard to win the World Touring Car Championship in 2022, a title he won in his fourth year in the world event… the last in WTCR history , since the reference touring car championship will become the TCR World Tour, whose calendar will consist of national and regional TCR events.
Likewise, in 2022 Dani Sordo had a good season in the World Rally Championship with Hyundai, achieving three consecutive podiums in Portugal, Italy and Sweden, which came after another two consecutive podiums in Spain and Italy the previous year.
In 2023, Sordo, who competes with Cándido Carrera as co-driver, turns 20 in the World Championship and is once again following a partial program with Hyundai, considered one of the most experienced and reliable drivers in the WRC.
Without leaving the field of rallying, Pepe López and Borja Rozada, five times Spanish Rally Champions and defending champions, will once again drive a Teo Martín Motorsport Hyundai i20 N Rally2.
Iván Ares and José Pintor, and Surhayen Pernía and Alba Sánchez will also compete in the National, as well as the brand’s new addition, Óscar Palomo, only 20 years old, with Xevi Moreno as co-driver.
Last but not least, José Manuel Pérez-Aicart and Javier Herrera were present, who were proclaimed winners of the Spanish Alternative Energies Championship with an electric Hyundai Kona last season.
“No brand bets on competition in Spain like Hyundai”
“We are a brand that has evolved a lot, and when I see it I get excited, because I remember when we started in 1992 with the Pony Cup, with a car that was not racing,” explains Polo Satrústegui, general director of Hyundai Spain.
“We spent 10 years organizing cups with great enthusiasm, when Hyundai was an unknown brand and did not have a great product. Little by little, we have evolved and what we see today is a reflection of the brand’s position.”
“There is no brand that is betting on competition in Spain as Hyundai is doing, and this is due to the team behind it, which has always believed in competition. Sport is a reflection of the brand and the brand, of the sport,” he adds.
This year, Hyundai has not only celebrated successes in sports, it has also done so in the car market: “Last year Hyundai was the third largest manufacturer in the world and the third brand in Spain. We have been World Touring Car Champions, Champions of Spain of Rallys and of Alternative Energies, and we hope to fight for the title in the WRC this year.”
“There are a lot of successes that go hand in hand with what the brand is achieving in terms of sales results. We will continue to support the sport because we believe in it; the sport makes no sense without the support of the brands,” said Satrústegui.
