Norwegian Petter Solberg has officially unveiled his own ‘Petter Solberg World Rally Team’ six days before the start of his home round of the 2009 WRC season.

Solberg decided to build his own team after Subaru’s departure from the series coupled with a lack of seats at the other manufacturer teams left him without a drive for 2009.

Faced with the prospect of sitting out at least one season, the 2003 World Rally Champion decided instead to create his own team from scratch. And true to his new team’s official motto ‘never give up’ he’s done it in a little over a month.

With the help of his team’s main sponsor, Norwegian boat charter company Johs Lunde yachting, Petter acquired a 2006 specification (active front and rear diff) Citroen Xsara WRC with which he hopes to tackle the remaining 11 rounds this year, accompanied by co-driver Phil Mills.

The new 10-strong team is managed by Ken Rees, ex team-co-ordinator of the Subaru World Rally Team. Unsurprisingly Petter has recruited other ex Subaru names too - including mechanic Tore Dahl, chief engineer Charles Hodge and his ex rally engineer Francois Xavier de Maison, whose motorsport company will maintain the black and silver Xsara between events.

De Maison’s existing commitments as Conrad Rautenbach’s engineer at the Citroen Junior Team means he will not provide Petter’s team with on-event support. A second engineer, Karine Vassant, will work alongside Hodge on rallies.

“I have been working flat out, and I’m really proud to the present my new team today,” Petter said at a launch in his home town of Spydeberg. “I have a lot of brilliant people around me, and they have all been working 24hrs shifts for me the past weeks. Without them and my sponsors, this would not have been possible.”