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Former Citroen Racing World Rally Championship team principal Yves Matton has been confirmed as the FIA’s new rally director.
Matton will take over from Jarmo Mahonen at the head of the governing body’s rally department, while his job at Citroen will be taken by Pierre Budar – who had run PSA Motorsport’s customer racing department.
Budar takes over as Citroen Racing director from Monday, with Matton expected to step into his new job at the start of next month.
Autosport revealed last week that Matton spent last Monday in discussions with the FIA before moving on to talk about his possible exit from Citroen the following day.
He had run Citroen’s WRC and now-defunct World Touring Car Championship programmes since Olivier Quesnel’s departure at the end of 2011.
Matton admitted to Autosport last week that he was interested in the FIA rally director role, which encompasses everything from the national rallying ladder all the way to the pinnacle of the WRC.
“I feel very honoured to take on this position at the FIA, the governing body of world motor sport,” said Matton.
“I have worked at various levels of the sport, including for one of the most successful manufacturers in history, but this is for me a real achievement in itself.”
FIA president Jean Todt said the experience Matton brought to the role would be “important” for rallying’s “continued growth”.
“He has great passion for the sport and his understanding of competition and management at independent and manufacturer levels will be a great asset to further securing the future development of our sport,” said Todt.
“I would also like to thank PSA Motorsport for making Yves’ transition to the FIA so seamless.
Budar (above) told Autosport: “You could call this the dream job for me.
“I was a driver when I started my career, but I graduated as an engineer and had to chose between the two – I am very happy to be where I am now!
“We have seen last year – when the Citroen C3 WRC won rallies – we don’t have a bad car and we have the tools to build this team.
“Let’s see what is possible, we will go rally-by-rally this year, but we have a very good team and we all know very good drivers.”