Andretti Autosport is bringing in the Beetle for their Red Bull Global Rallycross title contender, Scott Speed.
The former NASCAR and Formula One racer has earned three victories this season driving the No. 77 Volkswagen Polo and is one of four contenders with a chance to take home the championship in Wednesday’s season finale at Las Vegas.
But instead of sticking with the Polo for the final battle, Speed will drive VW’s latest version of the Beetle. The car made its 2014 debut in Los Angeles with Speed’s teammate, Tanner Foust.
“We’ve driven it enough to feel more confident with this,” Speed told the series website. “Obviously, we’d like to have had more testing with it before we bring it out in race circumstances, but we feel like our odds are better with this than with the Polo.
“I think everyone here is just happy to get working on what our future is, and that’s this car, which hopefully gets off to a good start.”
Down 29 points in the championship to leader Joni Wiman, Speed will need help in order to emerge with the GRC crown. But the American driver isn’t worrying about that scenario, and is simply keeping his focus on taking the checkered flag this week in Sin City.
“As far as championships are concerned, if we walk away from there with four total wins and the Championship winner has no wins, then we’ll still feel pretty good about ourselves and the year we have had,” he said in a team release – perhaps referencing the fact that two of the four championship hopefuls, Wiman and Nelson Piquet Jr., have not yet won a race this season.
“We’ll just control what we can control in Vegas, try to walk away with another win, and call it a good year overall for the No. 77 7UP Volkswagen Andretti team.”
Tomorrow will see practice, qualifying, and heats for the GRC contingent, followed by the main event on Wednesday evening. NBC will broadcast the Vegas final on Sunday, Nov. 16 at 1:30 p.m. ET.
