Meeke rates Finland as his best yet

Kris Meeke has described his third-place-finish at Neste Oil Rally Finland as his best-ever performance in a rally car.

The result was the Citroen driver’s third podium of the season – following on from Monte Carlo and Argentina – as a fully-fledged factory driver and he was only 50.6s off the rally-winning pace that was set by local hero, Jari-Matti Latvala.

“For me, this is by far my best performance,” Meeke admitted. “Monte is a tricky event where you have to hang in there and we played the consistent card on my first event with the team, while in Argentina we had to hang on for the result in tricky conditions.

“But to come to Finland, to go racing at the highest speeds of them all and to be only 13s behind Jari (-Matti Latvala) after two full days of rallying was pretty satisfying. I’m really, really happy to be on the pace. There’s still a few per cent to find if we’re to be on the pace of the top guys but we’ll definitely keep searching for that speed.”

Meeke attributed much of his impressive performance in Finland to the fact that he had driven the event in a Citroen DS3 WRC last year.

He said: “After doing Finland last year, everything feels so much more comfortable when you come back to an environment you know and it all just clicked this weekend.

“You need experience and knowledge to go very fast. You have to let the flow and rhythm happen in the stage. The moment you start trying at a rally like this, the time just disappears.”

Meeke’s attention has now turned to building on his Finland performance with another strong showing at the upcoming Rallye Deutschland (21-24 August) – his first asphalt rally in three years.

“I really love the rally and I know the car is strong there,” he said. “I’m going to enjoy it. Whether we’re on the pace or not, we’ll have to see.”