Steve Arpin is confident that Loenbro Motorsports can take the fight to the all-conquering Volkswagen team in Red Bull Global Rallycross this year, despite their lack of factory backing.
Loenbro, who enter this season after taking full control of Chip Ganassi Racing‘s entry, will be the only multi-car privateer team in the championship this year, alongside the works VW, Honda, and Subaru entries.
However, Arpin feels that the team can still mount a solid title tilt, despite the challenges of working without factory backing.
“We’d probably be sitting on the outside looking in and taking a year off and finishing while we’re on top so we definitely think that,” Arpin told The Checkered Flag when asked if Loenbro Motorsports can be title contenders this year.
“That being said, we had a significant list of areas that were our absolute weak spots. Not having the financial support of a works programme made it hard for us to develop and fix those issues on the go during the season and that was just something that we weren’t able to do, it wasn’t in our control,” he admitted.
“Now with a little time in the off-season to work within our budget and figure that kind of stuff out with the talent that we have here in our team, we’re able to accomplish that,” the Canadian insisted. “We have such a strong group of people, we took all the data that we accrued last year and we’re going to come out of the box strong this year.
“That being said, I definitely honestly feel that we have a shot,” Arpin said. “We had an incredible increase in performance from 2015 to 2016 and I honestly believe that we have the ability.”
Loenbro Motorsports have yet to confirm any drivers for the upcoming Red Bull GRC season, but Arpin is working on securing a package that will enable him to return behind the wheel of one of the team’s cars.
Loenbro have co-owned the team with Chip Ganassi Racing for the last two seasons – Credit: Larry Chen/RedBull GRC
