FRANCOIS DUVAL
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For François Duval rallying is in the blood. His father, René Duval, was a regular competitor in rally and rally sprint events in Belgium, and winner of the Belgian Rally Sprint Championship in 1994. With so much motorsport going on around him, it was almost inevitable that the young François would want to get involved too. By the age of six he was riding a 50cc quad-bike, and he started driving karts at around the same time. As a teenager he competed in the Belgian and European karting championships and continued to hone his loose surface skills on quads: he won the Belgian Championship for small-capacity quads in 1995 and for large-engined quads in 1997 and 1998.
In March 1999 he made his rally debut in Belgium's Citroen Saxo Challenge, claiming a podium position on his first outing. He went on to score four wins and a second place to clinch the championship. As well as entering the Belgian Rally Championship in 2000, which he finished third overall, Duval joined the Mitsubishi Marlboro Junior Team, driving a Group N Lancer on three other European rallies - Luxembourg, Ypres and Condroz.
Duval contested 17 rallies in 2001 and whenever his cars were reliable he was both fast and well placed. With Mitsubishi he tackled Luxembourg again and then took part in three rounds of the WRC - Portugal, Cyprus and Australia. The most significant part of his year, however, was spent with Ford, competing in a Puma in the inaugural season of the lower-rung Super 1600 category of the World Rally Championship (latterly the Junior World Rally Championship).
Duval had an expanded factory programme with Ford Rallye Sport in 2002, driving a Puma Super 1600 in the Junior championship and a Focus RS WRC on five rounds of the WRC, achieving a best result of tenth overall on the Swedish Rally. In 2003 Duval was promoted to the Ford Rally Sport WRC team for a full WRC season. His best result was the third place he achieved on the Rally of Turkey. He remained with Ford in 2004 and finished the year sixth in the Drivers' championship after five podium results. He switched to Citroën for 2005 and ended the year with his first ever WRC win on the final round in Australia. Despite this tremendous achievement, Duval was without a full time drive in 2006 and 2007. He contested a total of eight rallies with Škoda in 2006 and 2007, but later switched to a more competitive customer specification Citroën for three more events in 2007, and scored a second place in Germany.
In 2008 Duval returns to the Ford camp, flying the flag high for the Stobart VK M-Sport Ford rally team. He will compete in a Ford Focus RS WRC 07 on the historic roads of Rally Monte Carlo - the championship's opening round.