Rally 2017 World Rally Championship

That's why I find this thing so bizarre. Whoever is behind Rally the World isn't being particularly subtle about it - and they clearly have a connection to Volkswagen, given that they have access to a reliveried 2016 Polo (which is possibly a 2017 Polo) and a GRC Beetle. But the mainstream media are convinced that any privateer campaign is dead in the water. True, this is a marketing exercise and its purpose is unclear at this point, and it's hard to ignore the likes of Demaison when he says that the Polo won't race, but the mainsteam motorsport media seem intent on avoiding all mention of this. Indeed, David Evans goes out of his way to mention that the Qatar-backed effort is increasingly unlikely, even shoehorning it into articles that are only tangentially related to it.

 

Yep Japan hosted WRC events from 2004 to 2010 (except in 2009).
Full gravel event held in the forests of Hokkaido, where sometimes bears were sighted near spectators aeras .



Event was hugely popular especially on road sections (between the stages)

 

From memory the roads were all really tight and challenging there, attrition was so high Mathew Wilson almost finished on the podium once!

 

For a frame you can also see this angle on the VW video, looks like there might be a norvegian flag on the roof.
We know that Qatar has almost no chance to run the 2017 polos, but we know that Mads Ostberg and his team Adapta Motorsport wants to run a 2017 car next season could it be possible via a partial agreement with RedBull, Mikkelsen family (which is quite wealthy) and/or Qatar ?
A few people close to VW seems to be very excited since this video appeared, hope a last minute deal was found.

 

It's definitely a different livery, but I think it's a stretch to say the Norwegian flag is visible.

 

Just a joke concerning the Ostberg and Mikkelsen rumours.

 

What video is it from? I don't recall seeing a rear-angle shot in the one with the magician.

 

Well new tweet from VW rally twitter "see you in 2017" :

Something is happening or they are joking with us at this point.

It's actually the same video, if you put the player on youtube at 0.25x speed you can see it :

 

But that is the TCR Golf!

 

Maybe VW rally team is going to run the table in TCR the way Citroen did in WTCC??

 

Hopefully they will make an announcement sooner rather than later

 

In that order for looks. As far as speed goes, I think the Hyundai will likely be the quickest. But the Fiesta will be winning because Ogier/Ingrassa griphax haha

 

I find this funny because Rovaniemi in Finland styles itself as the home of Santa Claus. But it's also the base of operations for Toyota.

 

Looks like M-Sport got a sponsorship deal with Red Bull for christmas. (Red Bull logo visible on the hood)

 

rallytheworld hasn't been active since the 23rd, but the last few Tweets that they made claim that they lost the car completely. Since rallytheworld is Volkswagen's WRC channel on social media, I think we're meant to take that to mean that someone else has it.

Good catch. Hopefully it will be something a little bit different, and not just the Volkswagen livery plastered on a Fiesta.

 

Red Bull backing for Ogier - but not for Tänak, who will instead run a OneBet livery:

http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/127574/msport-reveals-first-look-at-ogier-livery

Final designs to be unveiled at ASI.

 

I want to get back to actively watching WRC again now that Toyota is back, so this thread is greatly welcomed.

 

*rubs all kinds of charms* Come ooooonnn Castrol Yaris!

 

They've already unveiled their livery - it's in the style of the TS050, with Microsoft backing.

 

Another pictures of the back looks great :

And Tanak livery without the RedBull, looks very nice too :

 

Ogier's livery really does look unfinished, especially around the front - it's like they had three or four different ideas of what the final design could be, and so slapped them all together. Hopefully the design unveiled at ASI wil be cleaner.

 

Yep. Just hoping for a bit of nostalgia.

 

I just realised that the base liveries are identical; Ogier's simply has the Red Bull logo on top of it. To be fair, M-Sport did release the photos at 2:00am my time and I was slightly drunk.

Still, it's the white around the front end - particularly the way it stops so abruptly - that spoils it.

 

It looked a bit better on the concept art, but not to found of the front either. The back looks nicer.

 

Is it me, or do these two liveries not line up properly?




Sure, we know that Red Bull is backing M-Sport, but that's an extension of a personal sponsorship with Ogier and Ingrassia. So they could theoretically put their name to two cars from separate teams - especially if they wanted to hold on to Mikkelsen. In fact, I'm sure of it, since those red slashes weren't on the 2016 car. Why would they make a brand-new livery for a car that officially is not competing just to show it in a few seconds of video?

However, the back of the top livery mirrors the one used by Volkswagen Motorsport this year, so the slashes of blue and white (and red) should wrap around the car. But there's no indication of that in the rear shot, which makes me think that they're two different liveries: a Red Bull/Qatar one for Mikkelsen, and a Qatar design for Al-Attiyah.

 

There is also no seats in that polo, does that mean there are already taken by someone ?

 

I reckon both of the works M-Sport cars will finish the season in the same livery, Tanak just needs to back up his pace with a few results.

 

The Red Bull livery in the VW clip could just as well have been added in post production.

 

That's a pretty elaborate (not to mention expensive) proposition.