User:Володимир Корся/Volodymyr Korsia

'''Volodymyr Yu. Korsya''' (born on September 5, 1993, in Odessa, Ukraine) is a Ukrainian auto and motorcycle racer, Master of Sports of Ukraine. Among other drivers, he is known as an Absolute rally champion of Ukraine and a winner of the World Rally Championship stages in the WRC 2 classification. According to ewrc-results.com, Volodymyr is the youngest co-pilot who won a special section of WRC 2 and the youngest co-driver who started in WRC 2. As of 2021, he is the youngest Ukrainian rally driver who participated in more than 100 rally competitions of various levels.

2010: First Steps
In 2010, 17-year-old Volodymyr Korsya started the Liman Cup to assist Yuryi Kasim. However, that collaboration lasted two races only. By the end of the season, Volodymyr participated in 5 stages together with another Odessa sportsman - Dmytro Tananevych. That same year, he managed to win his debut podium: one at the Liman Cup stage and another at the Ukrainian Rally Cup stage.

2011: Odessa Rally Team
In the season of 2011, a new team - Odessa Rally Team – made its debut in the Championship of Ukraine. From the very beginning, the team consisted of Odessa racers only. The very first "small" victory in the appropriate class of the Ukrainian Rally Championship came together with Dmytro Tananevych at the Kievan Rus rally, and the season was finished as the vice-champion in A7 class. Moreover, Volodymyr participated in two stages of the Liman Cup series together with Serhii Faiuk. The first foreign experience was gained at the end of the year, when Volodymyr together with Dmytro Tananevych covered the distances of the Pskov Rally and Christmas Rally in Belarus.

2012—2013:Mentos Ascania Racing
In 2012, Volodymyr’s progress did not stop. Together with Dmytro Tananevych they made their second attempt to become the best in the top league of the Ukrainian rally, where the 5th class was updated according to the international classification. That attempt was successful only partially. Volodymyr won the title of champion among co-pilots, and Dmytro was the second. Interestingly, Volodymyr got the title despite the fact that he entered a pit stop area almost “under the hood” of his vehicle, as he had to control the accelerator rod broken immediately after the final special section finished. That situation appeared to be a speaking proof of a proverb that the race ends not when the special section finishes, but on the finish podium.

The competition in the team classification, which scoring system was changed in 2012, resulted in the need for each team to have at least one crew in each class. Thus, a crew of Tananevych and Korsya became a part of the champion Mentos Ascania Racing. Until then, the Kyiv team scored its points in the Ukrainian Rally Championship only by their own crews and on the vehicles owned and serviced by the team.

Cooperation with Mentos Ascania Racing and search by the team for a new co-driver led Volodymyr to participation, along with Valeriy Gorban, in the World Championships held in Sweden in February 2013.

2013 became a turning point for the co-driver from Odessa: he got a new team, new crew, and new vehicle. During the Swedish Rally the team used to feel acutely all the peculiarities of driving Mitsubishi Lancer, and that same year they started the Rally de Portugal 2013 on the brand new Mini JCW RRC.

It did not take too long to taste champagne for the first win in overall standings, which happened already at the first stage of the Ukrainian Rally Championship held in Kherson. 2013 was a year full of various events, including the competition for the title of absolute champion on a completely new vehicle of the world class and participation in the world rally that was an absolutely new level. Nobody pushed for the results. Still there was no room for an error of such a team, and the results had to come naturally.

In 2014, the team finally switched to foreign competitions only. However, Volodymyr participates in the Ukrainian Rally Championship sometimes. New times force it to explore new horizons.

2013 — 2016: Eurolamp World Rally Team
The whole season of the 2013 World Championship was spent under the red banner of Mentos Ascania Racing. New vehicles and new levels of competition have clearly shown which direction to choose.

In 2014, the team changed its title sponsor, name and colors. The well-known red Mini JCW RRC turned to green-red.

The second season in the WRC-2 classification may be confidently named as a season of stability. Seven stages ended with seven finishes, six of which were in the top ten of WRC-2. The Polish rally appeared to be the best for the crew that managed to finish a hand's width apart the podium, i.e. on the 4th place.

The season of 2015 was marked by the third place both in the WRC-2 standings and in Valeriy Gorban’s crew. Traditional stages within the European continent were added with the overseas ones. And the first start brought the long-awaited winning in the WRC-2 classification.

A trip to Mexico was not successful, as a swathe of problems did not allow the team to finish in the Central American race. It managed to score points only twice in all 5 stages, which took place later, whereas the race in Poland changed the speed of the crew’s play completely. A curious incident when the crew’s pilot was arrested by the police without any grounds made further participation in the race impossible. The team’s season was traditionally finished in Wales, although only the crew and team staff know how pleasant and difficult it was at the same time.

That was the last year when Mini John Cooper Works RRC participated in the World Rally Championship. The time for Mini John Cooper Works WRC has come.

In 2016, the team was forced to use Mini JCW WRC. Minor improvements made it possible to easily transform the RRC vehicle into the WRC one. It was the time to compete grand champions, and each crew member had the opportunity to write his name in the world rally history. The season traditionally started with the Swedish stage, which demonstrated the need to learn all over again. The stage in Mexico was conquered on the second try, and the crew scored points in overall standings for the first time. Later on, the team experienced difficulties of getting even to the top 20. The level of competition increased significantly, whereas the Prodrive’s vehicles remained almost unchanged. At the end of the season the team finally managed to taste champagne, although it happened at the domestic Chumatskyi Shlyah rally. That year was the last one in the common career of Volodymyr Korsya and Valeriy Gorban. The desire of Odessa’s sportsman to go further, but in a different way led him to the Estonian ALM Motorsport.

2019 — :ALM Motorsport
Volodymyr managed to get back to the World Rally Championship only in 2019. Together with Georg Linnamäe he participated in Vodafone Rally de Portugal 2019 on Peugeot 208 R2 vehicle. Two stages on a two-wheel drive vehicle contributed to the team’s experience and returned the Ukrainian flag to the world rally arena.

Year of 2020 was difficult for the whole racing sport. Nevertheless, before a lockdown the team managed to pass "almost winter" rally in Sweden on the same vehicle. In Estonia, which hosted the WRC for the first time, the crew of Volodymyr and Georg Linnamäe debuted on a more impressive vehicle - Volkswagen Polo GTI R5.

Championships in other countries.
In 2017, the crew of Volodymyr and Oleksandr Kudriavtsev managed to finish on their two-wheel drive Peugeot 208R2 at two championship stages – in Latvia and Estonia. During the season, they won the EMV2 class at the RR ESTONIA Tartu Ralli. At the end of the year it appeared that the crew stopped in the Latvian Rally Championship only one step away from the podium in the LRČ 3 class.

In 2018, cooperation with Oleksandr Kudriavtsev was continued and the crew participated in the stages of the Estonian and Latvian Championships. Moreover, Volodymyr together with Linnamäe Georg started at the Norwegian KNA Rally Finnskog, where he used to read the pacenotes in English for the first time. That year was less successful for a podium bubbly, and at the end of the season the crew of Kudriavtsev and Korsya ceased to exist.

2019 presented a new opportunity to participate in the Iberian Rally Trophy and Peugeot Rally Cup Ibérica on the Iberian Peninsula, as well as in the Championships of Portugal and Spain. In the first stage of the gravel Spanish Rally Championship, Volodymyr Korsya assisted Laur Andrus, who is the head of the ALM Motorsport team. The first common start led the crew to the 14th place in overall standings and the 2nd place in the class. By the end of the season, the crew managed to podium three more times in different countries. Following the season results in Peugeot Rally Cup Ibérica Volodymyr maintained his 12th position. 2020 started with the World Championship stage in Sweden, and by the end of February the crew managed to participate in the Rallye Serras de Fafe e Felgueiras as well. Unfortunately, later on all competitions were suspended until summer in view of the COVID-19 crisis.

The Estonian Rally Championship was opened on a principally different vehicle - Volkswagen Polo GTI R5. At the end of the season, after driving just two stages the crew managed to find a common language with the German vehicle and took the second place in overall standings of Saaremaa Rally 2020, as well as the first place in the class. Moreover, following the 2020 season results, Volodymyr won bronze medals in all-around standings and in EMV2 class of the Estonian Rally Championship.

Motorcycle sport.
In 2018 Volodymyr decided to compete on two wheelers. He simultaneously participated in extreme enduro races and HESU (Hard Enduro Series of Ukraine). That was the first and the biggest series of competitions in the Hard Enduro discipline in Ukraine. The series was aimed at identifying the strongest racers in the country and increasing the quality level of such sort of competitions. According to the rules, all competitions are to be held under different conditions and in different areas of the country. As such, it is possible to identify the strongest racers not only on their domestic tracks, but also "on the road". The surface type (for example, the surface of various competitions may consist of clay, stones, sand, snow or even ice) is extremely important for this kind of sport. Moreover, in this series the competitions are held during different times of the year and in different natural environments (like sea shore, mountains, natural landscape of the central part of Ukraine, etc.). This series gained in popularity very quickly: in 2021 the HESU stages appeared even on the world map of Enduro.

Following the results of 2020, Volodymyr got into the top 100 racers of Ukraine. He competes for the Odessa team D.M.C (Dirt Moto Cartel) on his KTM EXC 300 TPI motorcycle.