Tomorrow spells the start of a new era for Waterford's Craig Breen.
He embarks on the latest chapter of his professional rally career with the shakedown for Rally Monte Carlo.
The Slieverue native signed for Ford M-Sport before Christmas having spent three years with Hyundai.
While his time on the WRC stage to date has been spent as a backup driver, this is Breen's first chance to head up a team at the top level.
His regular co-driver Paul Nagle will be alongside in the new Ford Puma, with all the teams starting into the new hybrid era of world rallying.
The added challenge of using hybrid in competition for the first time is further enhanced with no mid-day service point on any of the event days.
This year’s Rally1 cars house a 100kW hybrid unit coupled to a 1.6-litre turbocharge internal combustion engine that uses 100% renewable fuel for the first time in the sport’s history.
Monte Carlo will provide the usual seasonal opener with drivers competing across mixed surfaces of tarmac, snow and ice.
Breen most recently competed at the event in 2019 when he was still with Citroen - placing ninth.
This calander year will be much different for the 2021 Killarney historic rally winner who will now be pulling up to the start line in Sweden, Croatia, Portugal, Italy, Jenya, Estonia, Finland, Greece, New Zealand, Spain, and Japan.
The shakedown gets underway tomorrow, with racing underway from Friday.
The traditional season opener will take place over four days, with the service park for this year based throughout the event in the Monaco harbour area.
Team Principal, M-Sport Ford World Rally Team, said: “There has been a huge amount of anticipation leading up to Monte-Carlo, both internally and from the fans, so we’re really excited to finally get out there and show everyone what we have been working on so hard over the past 18 months.
