June 9th 2023, Barcelona – The Brit Catie Munnings will return to the RX2e grid in its third season for, at least, two more races. Munnings made her debut in RX2e last season, where she raced at the first round in Höljes, Sweden, securing an 8th place. She was impressed by the car and the Championship, so that made her sign up for a few more races this year. “RX2e is one of the most competitive Championships, and is the perfect feeder series for WRX, one of the most exciting and technically challenging Championships for drivers in my opinion”, she explains as to why to comeback to this Championship.
She will be a part of #YellowSquad team, powered by Hansen Motorsport. “I have a very unique position with Timmy Hansen, who’s been my teammate in Extreme E for 3 years now, and it seems like the natural progression to continue working with team Hansen outside of that, it has been a big aim of mine for some time now. They have a wealth of knowledge, and I think this programme is the most effective way of me developing my skills, and having a good shot at some decent results. I’m looking forward to building on the relationship I have with the family and team – it feels like it will be a good year!”, Munnings exclaims.
For this upcoming RX2e season, Munnings expects to keep learning and do as best as possible: “I’m enjoying driving the electric cars and learning how they work, it’s pretty complicated and there’s a lot of different settings you can adjust with the way the powertrain and energy system works, so I’m looking forward to leaning on their experience for how to best set the cars up, and also learning from some of the most experienced spotters and team members in RX. My mission is always to do as well as possible, keep developing side by side race craft – I’ve got quite a bit of that in the last few years in the big Extreme E cars, but it will be important to develop that in the smaller, more nimble cars – and hopefully have some good results!”
Catie Munnings, whose original ambition was to become a vet, started competing in motorsport from a young age. Growing up on a farm, Catie was used to thrashing around on quad bikes from a young age before she started to enter local motorsport events across the UK. In 2016 and at just 18-years-old, Munnings made her ERC debut at the Ypres Rally behind the wheel of a Peugeot 208 VTi R2 for Saintéloc’s Junior Team and went on to win the European Rally Championship Ladies’ trophy. Catie was the first Brit to win a European Rally title in 49 years.
Besides the RX2e, Munnings races in Extreme E, where in the debut season won the inaugural Arctic X Prix in Greenland and scored two podiums. This season she achieved a second place in Hydro X Prix in Scotland.
Ahead of the start of the season, the Brit has tested with the ZEROID X1 in a private test done in Circuit de Calafat where she tried different settings to get the maximum out of the car. “I really enjoyed the test in Calafat, it’s pretty rare for me to be able to have a day where you go through the different set ups, and get to understand the car away from a racing environment – so I really enjoyed that. It was great to work with the QEV team and other drivers, to hear their experience in working with the car in different surfaces. It always impresses me how fast the car feels when you accelerate for the first time on tarmac, and I’m looking forward to having a lot of fun with it this year!”, Munnings says.
The new RX2e season will start at Hell, Norway on June 17th-18th. For more information about RX2e, please visit the official website at www.fia-rx2e.com.
