Mitsubishi has announced that their new-generation high-performance 4WD saloon, the Lancer Evolution X is to be used as the course car for the Japanese round of the FIA World Rally Championship (WRC).
Rally Japan is also the 6th round of the FIA Production Car World Rally Championship (PWRC) and will run from Friday 26th to Sunday 28th October 2007.
As the official Course car for Rally Japan, the Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution X will be the vehicle which runs though the route and all the demanding stages of the event ahead of the competitors to check track conditions making sure that everything is ready for the 14th round of the WRC.
The Course cars, often referred to as the 'Double Zero' and 'Zero' cars, travel through the course before the competing vehicles, 30-minutes for the Double Zero car and 15-minutes for the Zero car.
New developments include the integrated of a roll cage into the body of the car with extensive reinforcements resulting in the cars strength and stiffness being drastically upgraded from the normal road-going version. Purpose-built components have been used for the running gear and brakes with drive-train components specially developed by Ralliart featuring a constant-mesh close-ratio gearbox.