The 2021 season of Motorsport Italia begins with the FIA ​​Middle East Rally Championship (MERC), which will field a Skoda Fabia R5 next weekend in the Manateq Qatar International Rally scheduled from 29 to 31 January.
 
For the Italian team it will not only be a great sporting challenge, but also an important honor, given that the car will be driven by Sheikh Sh. Suhaim Al-Thani, currently head of the organizing committee of Doha 2030, the twenty-first edition of the Asian Games, the multisport event to be held in the most important Qatari city. Sh. Al-Thani will make his absolute debut in rallies, will be sailed by Hamad Al-Yafei and will bring a celebratory livery of Doha 2030 with the number # 9.
 
Race with an important tradition in the Persian Gulf, which was last held in 2019, the Manateq Qatar International Rally is one of the most popular and demanding events of the series, with its mainly desert special stages and some sections that are more like a rally-raid rather than a real rally.
 
The 2021 edition will be based at the Losail Sports Arena and will include an opening show rehearsal scheduled for Friday 19th on Katara beach following the starting ceremony and two stages with ten special stages for a total of 208.76 timed kilometers and almost 600 kilometers of route. At the start, in addition to Nasser Al-Attiyah (QA) recently second overall in the Dakar 2021, also the former WRC driver Kris Meeke (GB) and all the protagonists of the Middle East series.