Newly-formed allegiance SET-LOENBRO is delighted to announce its first driver for the 2024 season.
American ace Michael Leach will drive for the squad in its inaugural appearance with the new FC2 machine, racing in the opening two rounds of the Nordic-based RallyX season at Tierp in Sweden this weekend (May 10-11).
Leach’s career has predominantly revolved around racing on dirt ovals in the United States of America, competing around 60 times each year in the intense events.
The 20-year-old began his career racing Quarter Midgets on small asphalt ovals before moving to dirt racing. He has also gained experience in rally machinery, and rallycross – racing in the Americas Rallycross Championship driving an ARX2 car to regular final appearances in a partial 2019 campaign.
Having raced the single-specification Supercar Lites machines in ARX2, Leach will now enjoy the increased performance from the FC2, a new-for-2024 version of the concept designed to deliver equivalent performance to that of a rallycross Supercar.
Leach will use selected rounds of the RallyX series with the SET-LOENBRO squad to prepare for an effort in the 2024-2025 Nitrocross NEXT EVO category, the US season getting underway in September. Leach already has experience of racing in Nitrocross events, having driven in the side-by-side category at three events of the 2023-2024 campaign, finishing on the podium in Los Angeles.
SET-LOENBRO tested its first completed FC2 machine at Strangnas in Sweden on Tuesday, May 7, ahead of its debut at Tierp this weekend, while the team will announce further drivers in due course.
Michael Leach:
“I’m very excited to go overseas and race a completely different type of motor sport to what I’ve done before, and against other drivers im not familiar with. Working with Jussi [Pinomaki, SET Promotion CEO] and Aleksi has been very easy and fun – I couldn’t be happier to represent the SET-LOENBRO team surrounded by a great group of guys. Our main focus will be learning the cars and the tracks as quickly as possible to be competitive. I’m not sure what to expect, but I’m ready to go out to compete, and prioritise winning.”
Aleksi Koskinen, Team Manager, SET Promotion Customer Programmes:
“Michael has a lot of experience racing on dirt, so he should be well suited to some of the extreme tracks in America. We’re excited to work with him and see what we can achieve together. Our targets are to always achieve our best potential – ultimately in this game you always strive to win! Now that our first car is finished, thanks to the hard work of the guys in our team, we have started our on-track preparation programme with testing this week, and that will really extend into this weekend at Tierp. Of course we want a good result this weekend, but in this instance we are aiming to learn as much as possible as the primary aim.”
