Q&A with Craig Breen

This is what the Peugeot Rally Academy driver had to say at the pre-event press conference.

You’re in a great battle with Kajetan Kajetanowicz for the ERC title, but you really need to repeat your Acropolis Rally victory of last year. Are you feeling confident or a little anxious about this weekend, given its importance?“It’s a very important rally for me. I have fantastic memories from last year, arriving back at this service park with our first victory, so of course we come here in a very good mood. The only thing we can do is to try and win. We can’t control Kajto, and we can only manage our own rally and go from there. It’s a special rally. A long stage to start with, but compared to Corsica last week it’s an average length stage, so I’m not too worried about that. It’s going to be a tough rally though.”

Your ERC rivals have come straight from a gravel rally in Cyprus and you have come straight from the Tour de Corse on asphalt. Do you think that will put you at a disadvantage in the early gravel stages here in Greece?“I have to say that the first run on the test was a bit strange, because Corsica has so many corners and you’re carrying crazy speed on even low-speed corners, whereas here you are nearly stopped on the slow corners, so for your mind to adapt to that and understand that you have to be a lot more slower and a lot neater took a little bit of time. But I can’t use that as an excuse!”

You were third quickest in Qualifying and start eleventh on the road this afternoon. Are you reasonably happy with that?“It wasn’t so bad. I think we did the best job that we could. The stage went really well and we had no problems. I was reasonably happy with the time. The Qualifying Stage was three kilometres long and the opening stage this afternoon is nearly 45 kilometres long, so to try and get a measure of what will happen in the rally from the Qualifying Stage is a bit silly. When we come to the end of the first stage, and at the end of the second stage tonight, then we’ll have a more clearer picture.”