Autosportfoto

Rallycross legends: Jean-Luc Pailler

Rallycross Legend: Jean-Luc Pailler

The third instalment in a series looking at some of the legendary drivers to have starred in the first 50 years of rallycross

Name: Jean-Luc Pailler

Country: France

RX Highlight: 1993 FIA European Rallycross Champion

Age: 63

Frenchman Jean-Luc Pailler began his career in 2CV Cross in 1976, before switching to the French Rallycross Championship full-time from 1987, a series in which he would go on to score almost 100 victories, the first of which being achieved in 1988.

Initially racing a Group A Citroen BX in 87, Pailler moved to four-wheel drive competition at the start of the next decade, and won the French Championship in 1991 with eight wins to his credit. He won 11 events the following year, and completed a double in 1993 by claiming both his domestic crown and the European title, the highest level in the sport until the FIA World Rallycross Championship began over 20 years later. To claim his only international crown, Pailler beat Swede Kenneth Hansen by a single point.

Continuing his relationship with the Citroen brand, Pailler used a four-wheel drive Xantia in 1994 and won three times in Europe to be third overall at the end of the year, again winning the French Championship as part of a run of six consecutive crowns.

In the new millennium, Pailler drove a Peugeot 206 Supercar in 2000 and finished second in Euro RX while continuing to race at the front and claim wins. A new Peugeot 207 was built by his Pailler Competition team for 2007, which he used to win the French title, his last full-time appearance in the series, while he scored his final European Championship victory at Kerlabo in France in 2008, much to the delight of the partisan crowd. Pailler's final French Championship victory was at Essay in 2009, his 96th domestic career win.

Today, Paiiler continues to head up his team, which has won the French Rallycross Championship with his son Fabien at the wheel in recent years, along with a full-time European campaign for Fabien and another of his offspring, Jonathan, in 2015.

Next week in Loheac, the ninth round of the FIA World Rallycross Championship, Pailler will be reunited with his restored Citroen BX to take part in a series of ‘Rallycross Legends' demonstrations.

Zdroj: fiaworldrallycross.com