Montreal, February 6, 2003 — Karlstad, Sweden, and Maniwaki, Quebec, are an ocean apart, but the two places have something in common this weekend as the starting point for the first events of the season in the World Rally Championship for Production Cars and Canadian Rally Championship respectively.

In Sweden, Sherbrooke-Quebec-born, Vancouver-based driver and defending national champion Pat Richard, will be making his debut in the world championship in the Group N category, the first Canadian to do so. Richard and co-driver Mikael Johannson, of Sweden, will be at the wheel of the Impreza WRX STi Road Rocket, as Subaru Rally Team Canada (SRTC) becomes the first Canadian-based car maker to back a driver’s run for an FIA world title.

Richard will be without his regular co-driver, veteran Canadian rally driver Martin Headland, who sustained injuries to his sternum and ribs when he and Richard were involved in a collision with a non-rally vehicle on the first day of reconnaissance for the Swedish rally, earlier this week. Richard has been medically cleared to compete, although he is still experiencing considerable pain and does not expect to be in peak form.

“I’m just glad to be entered,” said Richard, who will be competing in six events in the 2003 Group N World Rally Championship, as well as selected events in the Canadian championship. “It was touch and go for a while whether I was going to be able to enter the rally. I don’t feel that I’m doing 100%, but it’s not 70% either.”

With reconnaissance cut short by the accident, Richard was unable to make pace notes for stages 1, 9 and 13, and the Canadian driver is concerned that this will put him at a disadvantage, at least at the start. This is where Johansson, who has more than 10 years of rallying experience and has competed in the Swedish rally on five previous occasions, is expected to play a major role.

“I think Pat is a good driver, but you can tell he is not used to studs,” said Johansson. “That first stage is like a dance floor with ice. After the first couple of stages, I think we will go very well.”

The Rally of Sweden is the only winter event in the FIA World Rally Championship, and one of two World rallies where studded tires are permitted. Event organizers expect course conditions to be conducive to good rallying, with a hard base to the special stages and at least some snow in the Hagfors region, the site of a new “sprint” stage.

While Richard is making history in Sweden, about 50 drivers will be tackling the tight, snow-banked course in the Maniwaki-Upper Gatineau region of Quebec, north of Ottawa at the Rallye Perce-Neige Maniwaki on Saturday, a rally that Richard won last year. There is no shortage of solid contenders in the open-class category at this year’s event, the oldest winter car rally in Canada and part of the Canadian championship since 1975.

Toronto’s Andrew Comrie-Picard, the runner-up to Richard for the national championship last year, gained his first experience ice racing in Maniwaki in 2002, and he has his Mitsubishi Lancer IV primed for the 500-kilometre course that wends through closed-off town roads and gravel roads that cut a swath through the forests.

Comrie-Picard will get a battle from such seasoned rally performers as local favourite Sylvain Erickson, who with his co-driver brother Philip, was able to draw on his knowledge of the territory to guide his Mitsubishi Lancer to victory two years ago.

Jean-Paul Perusse, of Montreal, a two-time winner of the event, is a leading contender in the Group 2 class for modified two-wheel-drive cars. He will be stiffly challenged by fellow Subaru Impreza driver Peter Thomson, of Toronto.

High resolution photos of Pat Richard at the WRC Swedish Rally are available at the following website: www.morisoncom.com/srtc/media

Information: Paul Vaillancourt III Torchia Communications (514) 288-8290 (514) 996-6224 paulv@torchiacom.com