When the FIA World Rallycross Championship 2019 starts in Abu Dhabi in April, a former DTM Champion will go for the World Championship title.

Timo Scheider has announced himself as a full season driver for the all-inkl.com Münnich Motorsport team.

40 year-old Scheider has been driving for the team on/off throughout the last 4 seasons in the World RX and World Touring Car Cup.

He had his best finish in the Rallycross standings in 2017, where he finished 10th, after losing out on a round, due to a date clash with his other activities as a works driver for BMW Motorsport.

Scheider will try to emulate his former Audi Sport teammate Mattias Ekström, by winning both the DTM and World Championship title in Rallycross. The Swede won the DTM title in 2004 and 2007 for Audi Sport, before he won the FIA World Rallycross Championship title in 2016.

Timo Scheider won the DTM title himself in 2008 and 2009, and got another 7 seasons for German teams, before they didn’t have a seat for him any longer. It wasn’t the smoothest departure from Audi Sport, but BMW were quick at grabbing him up, and put him in a GT3 car – they didn’t quite choose to put him into DTM, since their seats were already filled by several champions.

Scheider first tried out the World RX in 2015 and 2016, before finishing fourth in the 2016 final in Argentina – while driving for the privateer team all-inkl.com Münnich Motorsport.

Since they opted to reduce their programme for 2017, he chose to sign for MJP Racing Team Austria. It started out with an exceptional second place in Barcelona, but had to wait until the season finale in South Africa, before he was in the final again.

He returned to the all-inkl.com Münnich Motorsport in 2018 for a WTCR programme, and also got three weekends in the World RX, but without qualifying for any semifinals.

The team will build a brand new Seat Ibiza WRX for the German, so he can fight at the top of the field. The development are going lightning fast in the sport, so just one year old technology would be out-of-date. This development has been slowed down, since all works teams have pulled out from the series, leaving only privateers to fight for the title.

That makes Timo Scheider and all-inkl.com Münnich Motorsport believe in their chances of going right to the top of the World Championship in 2019.

The FIA World Rallycross Championship 2019 starts on 5 April in Abu Dhabi.