“The selection of roads has been done very, very carefully and gives us the widest possible window of options,” added Wheatley. “One of the challenges we had in Finland was the need to constantly repair the roads to keep them in the best possible condition – and, of course, you’re relying on the goodwill of the local population living alongside the roads. In France, at least some of the roads – and we’ve selected four – are purely used for testing.
“Another aspect for us is the logistics: it’s considerably easier to get to the south of France [from Germany] rather than Finland. And let’s remember, the reason the team moved to Finland was for a particular requirement to build more performance.
“While, maybe, the results don’t necessarily reflect that performance in places like Estonia and Finland last year, the car was working. The car was fast in Estonia and Finland, and I think that is valuable, and it has effectively done its job.”
While teams can run without restriction at their nominated test site, World Rally Championship regulations permit just 21 days of testing outside of that location – but always within Europe.
Toyota’s permanent test site is in Finland while M-Sport utilitzes Greystoke forest in England.