McRae Announces World Championship Farewell
The former champion, in a statement ahead of his "last outing in the series for the foreseeable future", said on Friday that he would take a sabbatical to explore other forms of motorsport such as the Dakar Rally.
The 35-year-old Scot has no drive for next year after Citroen announced they were not renewing his contract. Next week's season-ending British rally will be his farewell.
McRae has fallen foul of a rule change limiting teams to two registered cars next year. Citroen have already confirmed joint championship leaders Sebastien Loeb of France and Carlos Sainz of Spain.
"At the time Citroen made its decision, Carlos was in a stronger position in the championship than me and still is," said McRae, who has yet to win this year. "It also has very strong links with the Spanish market so both of these factors obviously contributed. Had the driver regulations not changed, Citroen had always stated they would keep all three of us. Now they can't."
McRae, a household name selling millions of computer and video games, won the title with Subaru in 1995 and jointly holds the sport's record of 25 wins. DAKAR CHANCE
"It didn't help that a definite decision wasn't made early enough in the year to give anyone a chance of securing a drive," McRae said of the Citroen decision. "Because of that, the only option left was to find the funds to pay for a drive and, given the short timescale, it's just almost impossible to pull that kind of money together."
McRae had explored the possibility of running a privately-entered car in a team run by his father Jimmy and with brother Alister, also out of a drive for next year.
The Scot said 2003 had not been his best year and he had not really enjoyed the season.
"I've always said that when I don't enjoy it, I would seriously consider stepping back. The results haven't been there and these two things go together. If you're enjoying it, you're competitive.
"I'm not as competitive as I want to be and this is another reason for pulling out.
"I'm not disappointed and in fact am very positive about the future," added McRae. "I'm really looking forward to getting into other forms of motorsport. It's something I've always said I wanted to do. "Everyone knows there are talks about me competing on the Dakar. Again, that's an event I've always thought about doing. There's potential for a deal there and also lots of others that would take me into different forms of motorsport."
The Scot has been linked to Nissan's Dakar team and is also keen on sportscar racing.
"2004 has the makings of a very interesting year and hopefully I will be in a position to make an announcement about certain things very soon," he said.