McRae says gravel events are key to title

The Ford star believes the car's performance on high-speed, loose surface events such as Finland, New Zealand and Australia is crucial to the team's season and says has seen an improvement while on the Finnish test.

"We've got to capitalise on our performance on those events," McRae told AUTOSPORT's sister publication Motorsport News. "There are improvements coming for the asphalt - Carlos had a very encouraging test on tarmac recently - but we had some ground to make up on rallies like Finland, and from this test it looks like we've kept in touch with Peugeot and Subaru."

Finnish drivers have dominated their home event, completely locking out the winner's spot, and while McRae says he will be aiming to break the Finnish stranglehold, a place on the podium might be more likely.

"You always go to these rallies with a win in mind. Maybe a victory is a tall order, but we're certainly thinking about a podium place. The car felt very good in the test; we've made a lot of improvements."

McRae rolled his car during the test, but said it didn't hamper the team's programme.

"It was quite a soft roll," he said. "The lads changed the windscreen and that was pretty much it."