haha you all need the "low down". I will give it to you since I was all over wrc.com forums from 2001-2003 when this all went down.

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'>WRC Accent has won how many championships? Zero.</div>

ArctiChill is being sarcastic. funy but true, however, the Accents may have not won any championships, but they sure did scare some of the Worlds top teams and match up to some of the worlds top cars.

hyundai began it's rally scene with the 1991 Scoupe in one race in 1991-1992 at the Pikes Peak. this was the only race it was in. it placed first and went to the books for best record time, in its class. they dropped the car and the Pikes Peak after they had won the event. then, as an introduction to experience in rallying, they raced in the F2 Championship from 1997 - 1999. The SCCA Coupes back then were privately owned and sponsored by owners. In the WRC, the F2 class showed stability and potential. The coupe was the F2 in 1998. When plans to make the F2 into a WRC car had shattered because they would have to homogolate (as part of the rules of the WRC all cars need to look alike or have exterior commonalities with commercial models sold to their customers and need to be approved) so in order to compete in the WRC, they hired MSD's Peter Stevens to design a front bumper and a rear wing for the Hyundai to make it more aggressive. To be homogolated, a certain amount of Tiburons resembling the F2 Rally Tiburon would have had to be distributed and sold hence Hyundai released its Formula 2 Evolution 2 in 1999, a month late missing Rallye of Monte Carlo. Hyundai did not want to begin its WRC journey with a New WRC car without any experience. Afterall, rallying is nothing but company reputation.

In WRC there are classes. WRC Cars are all four wheel drive and have around 300hp. (take note, they may be 300hp but each has many turbos, run on gasolene that shoots fire, every cubic inch of all parts and chassis are made of the highest quality and lightest materials in the world) 0-60 in about 2-3 seconds. they go on 60/40 weight distribution so drifting and taking corners at high speeds decreases track time.The F2 Cars had 250hp. They are front wheel drive only and the drivers are usually less experienced--but are hired by WRC teams if they have potential.

In order for them to run a WRC F2 EVO 2 Tiburon WRC all wheel drive, they would have to re-design the entire car for a car that was already 3 years old. It meant more than noticing its potential too late. The minimum homogolation of a certain rally car is 1500 hence why in 1999 Hyundai released the F2 EVO Hyundai exclusively released in Great Britain (lucky chaps). they knew they would run the Accent WRC's instead of Tiburon WRC's. Besides Drivers Alister McRae (Colin McRae's younger brother; Son of Legend Jimmy McRae) and Kenneth Eriksson complained about the lack of windshield visibility in the coupes.

The Coupe had 10 rallies competing against Renault Megane Coupe F2's and other zippy F2 Cars such as Citroen Xsara. Hyundai placed 1st in about 7 of the 10 rallies including multi-surface Rallies of: Portugal (Fafe Jump); Catalunya, Spain; San Remo, Italy, Sweden, Kenya, Africa; China; Great Britain.

It came down to the last rally of the 1999 Formula 2 World Rally Championship. Hyundai was on a role and had proved to be a tough competitor winning most all of the rallies it had competed in. Renault had 99 points and Hyundai had 102. It was the battle for the finish for the title on the last rally with Renault Meganes, in the last stage (course) of the year. Hyundai was leading Renault by a few seconds, until the unexpectable happened. The helicam spotted it first, with a shocking live footage of the Tiburon up in smoke. The fire rampaged and Alister McRae pulling the car aside and spraying the car with a fire extinguisher. McRae's Tiburon suffered a blown engine. Renault had snatched the World Title right from underneath Hyundai's tired fingers, the Megane passing the blown coupe to the finish line. There went the reputation Hyundai worked so hard for; They had to start over. By then, 2000, was too late to reconsider running a fourth generation Tiburon.

The Accent merged next month appearing in Rallye de Monte Carlo. Despite the experienced MSD's (Motor Sport Developments Hyundai, Milton Keynes, England) hard work, sponsorship and efforts, the car was faulty and experienced lots of mechanical failiures. They came out with a WRC Version 2 in 2002 driven by the King of the Kings of Kings, Finnish (where worlds most experienced WRC drivers come from), Juha Kankkunen. Rallying for more than 20 years, he drove the Accent WRC Version 2 to win fourth out of sixth overall in World Title (well ahead of Skoda WRC and Mitsubishi WRC) and put up quite a showcase, frightening even Ford who respectively were third!

There's nothing like seeing a cheap ass, undersponsored Korean Tin Can tearing up the rally scene and raising hell against the worlds highest ranking drivers and cars--and looking good doing it!

In conclusion, Hyundai had pulled out from the programme in 2003 after a useless battle that would show no results. The team lost its chances due to undersponsoring and unfair rallying; it's not fair when a kid throws a rock in your windshield and you lose time. Or a Citroen catches on fire and you pull over to see if they need help losing time. That's right... you get stalled for any reason (even if it involves a herd of sheep crossing the stage). Hyundai had no reason to stay. They were sued for millions becaus eleaving the WRC is against the rules and the entire team, MSD and crew were out of work for the rest of the season.

that same year, Hyundai announced they would return in 2006 with a brand new car designed in Germany and finished in MSD. It looks to be a three door hatchback resembling the new trend of the newest line of Hyundais (Sonata, HCD 8).

You have not heard the last of Hyundai. In 2006, an all new rally car (Accent roots unknown) brand new team, and lethal speed.