The Suzuki SX4 WRC is a

World Rally Car A World Rally Car is a racing automobile built to the specific regulations set by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA) and designed for competition in the World Rally Championship (WRC). The cars were introduced in 1997 as a repl ...

built for the Suzuki World Rally Team by Suzuki in the

World Rally Championship The World Rally Championship (abbreviated as WRC) is the highest level of global competition in the motorsport discipline of rallying, owned and governed by the FIA. There are separate championships for drivers, co-drivers, manufacturers and t ...

. It is based upon the

Suzuki SX4 The Suzuki SX4 is a subcompact car and crossover produced by Japanese automaker Suzuki since 2006. A successor of the Aerio tall hatchback and sedan, the first-generation model was available as a hatchback and sedan, with the former available i ...

road car, and was debuted at the

2007 Tour de Corse Results of Tour de Corse (''51ème Tour de Corse - Rallye de France''), 13th round of 2007 World Rally Championship, run on October 12–14. Citroën's Sébastien Loeb won the race, his 35th win in the World Rally Championship. The rally was the f ...

Competition history

World Rally Championship

Toni Gardemeister - 2008 Rallye de France SS5

At the 2007

Geneva Motor Show The Geneva International Motor Show is an annual auto show held in March in the Swiss city of Geneva. The show is hosted at the Palexpo, a convention centre located next to the Geneva Cointrin International Airport. The Salon is organised by th ...

, Suzuki announced it would enter the FIA

, with the factory backed Suzuki World Rally Team in the World Rally Car category in 2007, using the SX4 WRC with AWD and the J20 engine producing and of torque. However, due to WRC calendar changes Suzuki officially debuted in

2008 File:2008 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: Lehman Brothers went bankrupt following the Subprime mortgage crisis; Cyclone Nargis killed more than 138,000 in Myanmar; A scene from the opening ceremony of the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing; ...

, using the season of 2007 as further development time for the SX4. The SX4 competed on a test basis in two 2007 WRC events: the Rallye de France in October 2007 (finishing 31st overall) and the

Rally GB Wales Rally GB was the most recent iteration of the United Kingdom's premier international motor rally, which ran under various names since the first event held in 1932. It was consistently a round of the FIA World Rally Championship (WRC) calen ...

in November 2007 (finishing 27th overall). In the first event of 2008, the

Rallye Monte Carlo The Monte Carlo Rally or Rallye Monte-Carlo (officially ''Rallye Automobile de Monte-Carlo'') is a rallying event organised each year by the Automobile Club de Monaco. The rally now takes place along the French Riviera in Monaco and southeast ...

, Suzuki driver Per-Gunnar Andersson finished eighth.

Hillclimbing

A race car called 'Suzuki SX4 Hill Climb Special' was used at the 2011

Pikes Peak International Hill Climb The Pikes Peak International Hill Climb (PPIHC), also known as The Race to the Clouds, is an annual automobile hillclimb to the summit of Pikes Peak in Colorado, USA. The track measures and has over 156 turns, climbing from the sta ...

. It was a specially adapted Suzuki SX4, with a twin turbocharged 3.1 litre V6 engine producing and of torque. Driver

Nobuhiro Tajima , nicknamed "Monster", is a hillclimb racer, tuning shop owner, rally team manager and former rally driver who is best known for his participation in Suzuki's rallying program as well as his triumphs at the Pikes Peak International Hillclimb in ...

won the event in Suzukis for six years running, the last three of which were in the SX4 HCS, and set the track record time of 9:51.278.

Competition history

World Rally Championship

Hillclimbing

Rally results

Complete World Rally Championship results

References

External links