{"id":5184,"date":"2026-04-11T11:33:55","date_gmt":"2026-04-11T10:33:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/176.32.230.251\/melvynevansmotorsport.com\/?p=5184"},"modified":"2026-04-11T11:38:31","modified_gmt":"2026-04-11T10:38:31","slug":"castrol-mem-rally-team-set-to-begin-2026-british-rally-championship-drivers-and-teams-title-challenge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/176.32.230.251\/melvynevansmotorsport.com\/2026\/04\/11\/castrol-mem-rally-team-set-to-begin-2026-british-rally-championship-drivers-and-teams-title-challenge\/","title":{"rendered":"Castrol MEM Rally Team set to begin 2026 British Rally Championship drivers\u2019 and teams\u2019 title challenge"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The Castrol MEM Rally Team begins its 2026 British Rally Championship campaign on this weekend\u2019s Severn Valley Stages (Saturday 11 April), with new team-mates Meirion Evans and Osian Pryce ready to challenge for both the drivers\u2019 and teams\u2019 titles in a pair of Toyota GR Yaris Rally2 cars.
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Meirion heads to the opening round looking for his first major rally win on gravel \u2013 although a puncture near the end of the 2025 Malcolm Wilson Rally and a spin on the final stage of the recent Rally North Wales denied him a certain well-deserved victory on both occasions.
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Together with co-driver Dale Furniss (from Llanfyllin in Powys), Meirion tested his Pirelli-shod Toyota GR Yaris Rally2 in Gorsedd Bran forest (Denbighshire) yesterday \u2013 with the 30-year old from Lampeter in Carmarthenshire making subtle set up changes that have improved the car.
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Osian got his first taste of the Toyota GR Yaris Rally2\u2019s performance at the same Castrol MEM Rally Team test and immediately gelled with the Michelin-shod car.
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The 33-year old Machynlleth-born driver won the Severn Valley Stages in 2024 and is seeded at number one on what is the 2022 British champion\u2019s 125th rally start, meaning that he\u2019ll run as the first BRC car on the road.
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Osian will be reunited this weekend with James Morgan (from Llandysul in Ceredigion). They\u2019ve only contested one event together before, the Cambrian Rally 10 years ago.
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With just over 50 stage miles, this Saturday\u2019s Severn Valley Stages (which has a ceremonial start and finish in Llandrindod Wells and a midday service halt at the Royal Welsh Showground in Llanelwedd) will be a flat-out blast from the very beginning \u2013 with little margin for error in the classic mid-Wales forests of Sarnau, Myherin and Tarenig.
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Meirion Evans said: \u201cI\u2019m looking forward to this weekend\u2019s Severn Valley Stages, as it\u2019s nice to get the show on the road again. We\u2019re starting the new season aiming for some more strong results and hoping to challenge for rally victories and the BRC title like we did last year.
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\u201cWe had a good test yesterday and made some very positive steps with the Toyota Yaris. The car worked well on Rally North Wales, but I felt there were some things that could be improved and by exploring a few things during the test I feel that we\u2019ve made some steps in that direction. Hopefully that will help this weekend.
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\u201cIn fact, as the road was wet in the morning and dry in the afternoon, it was nice to get a mix of conditions which should benefit us not just for this weekend\u2019s Severn Valley Stages but the season ahead.\u201d
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Osian Pryce said: \u201cHaving now driven the Toyota GR Yaris Rally2, I don\u2019t see any reason why we shouldn\u2019t be aiming for a win on the Severn Valley Stages this weekend.
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\u201cThere wasn\u2019t much doubt in my mind that I\u2019d gel with the car, yet it was still reassuring to know that everything I\u2019d heard about the Toyota was correct and I felt comfortable in it straight away.
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\u201cI\u2019m also happy with being seeded at car number one. At the end of the day, I won the rally two years ago, so it\u2019s our turn to run first on the road and I\u2019m looking forward to it. Having a clean road ahead might even suit me. It is what it is, and we\u2019ll have to wait and see how that plays out.\u201d

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The Castrol MEM Rally Team begins its 2026 British Rally Championship campaign on this weekend\u2019s Severn Valley Stages (Saturday 11 April), with new team-mates Meirion Evans and Osian Pryce ready to challenge for both the […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5185,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[132],"tags":[108,129,28,106,127],"class_list":{"0":"post-5184","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-castrol-mem-rally-team","8":"tag-brc","9":"tag-castrol-mem-rally-team","10":"tag-meirion-evans","11":"tag-osian-pryce","12":"tag-toyota-yaris-rally-2"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/176.32.230.251\/melvynevansmotorsport.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5184","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/176.32.230.251\/melvynevansmotorsport.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/176.32.230.251\/melvynevansmotorsport.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/176.32.230.251\/melvynevansmotorsport.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/176.32.230.251\/melvynevansmotorsport.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5184"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/176.32.230.251\/melvynevansmotorsport.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5184\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5189,"href":"http:\/\/176.32.230.251\/melvynevansmotorsport.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5184\/revisions\/5189"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/176.32.230.251\/melvynevansmotorsport.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5185"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/176.32.230.251\/melvynevansmotorsport.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5184"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/176.32.230.251\/melvynevansmotorsport.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5184"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/176.32.230.251\/melvynevansmotorsport.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5184"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}