Kris Meeke
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| Nation: |
 Great Britain
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| World Rally Championship (WRC) | |||||||||
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| First rally: | Rally Wales 2002 | ||||||||
| Co-driver: |
Sebastian Marshall Paul Nagle
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| Team: | Toyota Gazoo Racing WRT | ||||||||
| Vehicle: | Toyota Yaris WRC | ||||||||
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| Points: | 511 | ||||||||
| Status: After the 2019 season | |||||||||
| Intercontinental Rally Challenge (IRC) | |||||||||
| First rally: | Rally Monte Carlo 2009 | ||||||||
| Last rally: | Rally Scotland 2010 | ||||||||
| Co-driver: |
Paul Nagle
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| Team: | Peugeot UK | ||||||||
| Vehicle: | Peugeot 207 S2000 | ||||||||
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| Championship title: | 2009 | ||||||||
| Points: | 99 | ||||||||
| Status: After the 2010 season | |||||||||
Kris Meeke (born July 2, 1979 in Dungannon ) is a British rally driver . He began his career as a CAD designer at M-Sport for the Ford World Rally Team. In 2001 he started at the “Peugeot Super 106 Cup”. At the Intercontinental Rally Challenge 2009 he was champion.
Career
Born in Northern Ireland , Meeke studied at Queen's University Belfast and graduated in mechanical engineering. He then worked as a designer at M-Sport . In 2000 Kris Meeke got actively involved in rallying. In the same year he won a competition for young rally drivers. In 2001 Meeke drove to his first victory in his third race in the Peugeot Super 106 Cup . At the beginning of 2002, the former rally driver Colin McRae noticed him and became his mentor. This year Meeke started at the "British Junior Championship", where he won his category at the Scottish Rally for the first time , after McRae visited the track for him and created the prayer book (route description) . At the end of this season his points were enough to win this championship and take third place in the “British S1600 Series”. In the same year he took part in his first world championship run at the closing event of the World Rally Championship in Wales , but did not reach the goal.
J-WRC
In 2002 and 2003 he competed in the J-WRC with an Opel Corsa S1600 . He finished five out of thirteen rallies. From the 2003 Rally Catalonia , Meeke switched to a Citroën C2 S1600 , with which he competed in the JWRC until 2007 . At the Rally Wales 2005 and the Rally Ireland 2007 he took part in the top rally class WRC with a Subaru Impreza WRC . In the first appearance he just missed a place in the points in ninth place. At the beginning of the 2008 season , Meeke switched to a Renault Clio S1600 (R3) . He only contested one rally in Spain with this vehicle.
IRC
In 2009 Meeke switched to the Intercontinental Rally Challenge (IRC), where he won four out of nine races with a Peugeot 207 S 2000 . He did not start in the rallies in Kenya and Russia, but still won the championship with a total of 60 points. In 2010 he started again at the IRC and was third overall in the championship with 39 points.
WRC
With his team-mate Dani Sordo , Meeke took part in the Prodrive- supported Mini WRC team in six races of the World Rally Championship in the 2011 season. In the rallies in Italy , Finland , Germany and France , he did not reach the goal. At the Rally of Catalonia , he made his first finish in the Mini World Rally Car . There he won the first evaluation test at the Power Stage , which was rewarded with bonus points, and finished fifth overall. At the Rally Great Britain , after a driving error on the last special stage, he narrowly missed the first podium and finished fourth. After six participations in thirteen rallies, Meeke finished eleventh in the 2011 World Rally Championship at the end of the season . After Mini Cooper WRC retired after the 2011 season, Meeke was left without a car for 2012 and rallies in national championships in the UK.
In 2013 he drove two world championship races for the Citroën works team. For 2014 , Kris Meeke got a contract with the Citroën factory team. He came third as the best results in Monte Carlo , Argentina , Finland and France . He was seventh in the World Championship with 92 World Championship points.
Kris Meeke won his first victory in the top WRC class at the 2015 Rally Argentina . The extremely emotional Citroën factory driver after this victory dedicated this success to his former sponsor Colin McRae , who died in a helicopter crash in 2007. This victory came as a bit of a surprise, as Meeke had to be content with a tenth place in the Rallye Monte Carlo , a seventh place in the Rallye Sweden and a 16th place in Mexico in the previous three world championship races.
In the course of the 2016 season , Citroen dropped out of the world championship to concentrate fully on developing the new 2017 Citroën C3 WRC . Kris Meeke played a crucial role in the test work.
In order to keep his form, Meeke started in selected WRC races in the Citroen DS3 WRC and was able to score points with his speed. Two victories went to his account, to the displeasure of Sebastien Ogier , who reluctantly let points stolen by a driver who is not fighting for the world championship.
Meeke won both the Rally Portugal 2016 and the Rally Finland 2016 .
After Meeke did not finish in 2017 with the new C3 in Monte Carlo, as in the previous year, he did cross the finish line in Sweden outside of the top 10, but as in the previous year he achieved the points in the power stage - he finished fourth and in contrast to the previous year, there were two points this time thanks to the new points system. In Mexico , Meeke clinched his fourth victory, although he lost almost 30 seconds on the last special stage due to a take-off. Meeke also led at the Rally France 2017 , his team's home rally, at times until he retired with engine problems. In Argentina and Italy , the Northern Irishman did not reach the finish line, in Portugal , where he had won the previous year, he finished 18th. He was then replaced for the Rally Poland by Stéphane Lefebvre , who himself was initially one of his two teammates alongside Craig Breen was, but was replaced by Andreas Mikkelsen due to poor performance . Before the end of the season, however, Mikkelsen left the team and switched to Hyundai. Meeke was seventh overall.
In 2018 Meeke drove the first six rallies. His best result was a third place at the Rally Mexico . He was then fired from Citroen, and for the rest of the season you mostly competed with Mads Østberg and Breen, as well as in individual races with Sébastien Loeb , who had returned to rallying, and with Khalid Al Qassimi .
Meeke then moved to Toyota Gazoo Racing WRT , where he drove the Toyota Yaris WRC . His best result in the 2019 season was a second place at the Rallye Deutschland . With a sixth place overall he beat his teammate Jari-Matti Latvala , while his second teammate Ott Tänak became world champion. After just one year, however, he lost his place at Toyota and is without a cockpit for the 2020 season .
WRC victories
| No. | season | rally | Co-driver | vehicle |
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| 1 | 2015 |
 Rally Argentina
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Paul Nagle | Citroën DS3 WRC |
| 2 | 2016 |
 Rally Portugal
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| 3 |
 Rally Finland
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| 4th | 2017 |
 Rally Mexico
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Citroën C3 WRC | |
| 5 |
 Rally Catalonia
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- Kris Meeke ...
... in the Citroën DS3 WRC (2014)
... on the way to victory at the Rally Portugal 2016
Results
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| Legend | ||
|---|---|---|
| colour | abbreviation | meaning |
| gold | - | victory |
| silver | - | 2nd place |
| bronze | - | 3rd place |
| green | - | Placement in the points |
| blue | - | Classified outside the point ranks |
| violet | DNF | Race not finished (did not finish) |
| NC | not classified | |
| red | DNQ | did not qualify |
| DNPQ | failed in pre-qualification (did not pre-qualify) | |
| black | DSQ | disqualified |
| White | DNS | not at the start (did not start) |
| WD | withdrawn | |
| Light Blue | PO | only participated in the training (practiced only) |
| TD | Friday test driver | |
| without | DNP | did not participate in the training (did not practice) |
| INJ | injured or sick | |
| EX | excluded | |
| DNA | did not arrive | |
| C. | Race canceled | |
| no participation in the World Cup | ||
| other | P / bold | Pole position |
| SR / italic | Fastest race lap | |
| * | not at the finish, but counted due to the distance covered |
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| () | Streak results | |
| underlined | Leader in the overall standings | |
Web links
Individual evidence
- ^ Profile of Kris Meeke ( memento from March 21, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) (krismeeke.com accessed on March 10, 2011)
- ^ Meeke at Rally Catalonia 2008
- ↑ Archive 2009 results ( Memento from June 3, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) (IRCseries.com accessed on March 11, 2011)
- ↑ Archive 2010 results ( Memento from November 22, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) (IRCseries.com accessed on March 10, 2011)
- ↑ Six participations planned (Motorsport-Magazin.com from March 1, 2011; accessed on March 11, 2011)
- ↑ motorsport-total.com: Kris Meeke: "Victory is for Colin!" , Retrieved April 28, 2015
- ↑ Kris Meeke ticks off WRC career: Future at the Dakar Rally? , motorsport-total.com from January 4, 2020; Accessed January 31, 2020
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Meeke, Kris |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | British rally driver |
| DATE OF BIRTH | 2nd July 1979 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Dungannon , UK |