André Villas-Boas rose to fame as a soccer coach after occupying the benches of teams like Porto, Chelsea, Tottenham or Zenit. In recent years, the Portuguese coach has been at the helm of Shanghai SIPG and Olympique de Marseille, job that he has been able to combine with his great passion, motorsport. It is not the first time we have spoken in Motor.es about the Portuguese coach and it does not seem that it will be the last either. for now, Villas-Boas will be at the controls of a Citroën C3 WRC at the next Rally de Portugal.
Villas-Boas begins to have a certain background in motorsport. In January 2018 he made his debut in the Dakar Rally with a Toyota Hilux, co-piloted by Rubén Faria. Although his adventure ended with abandonment in the fourth stage after colliding with a dune, suffering a back injury, André has not stopped competing. Since then he has contested the Baja TT do Pinhal with a Can-Am Maverick X3, in addition to contesting the Rally de Portugal in the WRC3 category in 2021. His debut in the World Championship came with a Citroën C3 Rally2 together with Gonçalo Magalhaes.
Although his WRC debut was not bad at all and served to raise awareness of the ‘Race for Good’ charity initiative, the Portuguese will go one step further this year. Of course, from another different profile. Villas-Boas will get behind the wheel of a Citroën C3 WRC that he bought from the PSA Group at the end of last year. This chassis was driven by Esapekka Lappi and will be part of the caravan of vehicles that will perform a demonstration as part of the celebration of the 50th anniversary of the World Rally Championship.
Chassis #21 of the Citroën C3 WRC occupies a privileged place in the private collection of André Villas-Boas, although the coach has not hesitated to join this show to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the WRC: «Not long ago the opportunity arose to buy the Citroën C3 WRC from the PSA Group. We came to an agreement and I finally brought him home. It’s one of the most incredible cars I’ve ever driven, if not the most. We did a few laps in Lousada and then I took him for a ride to Vienna. It really is spice.”
As a result of this participation in the event attached to the Rally de Portugal with historic cars, André has confessed: «I like to collect prestige cars. I’ve always wanted to own rally cars, so I started researching. At first I was a bit lost on which rally cars to buy. Fortunately, I have a good relationship with the PSA Group and the first car I bought was a Sébastien Loeb Citroën C4 WRC. Then came other cars and later this C3 WRC. I look forward to driving it again.”
Photos: FIA WRC