WRC Season ArchiveRally 

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prisonermonkeys
I'm sure his comments about prostitutes will go over real well with Mini ...
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Ya, I was thinking that myself, I don't think it'll do him any favors...
 
Something interesting I noticed in the reports about Argentina:
The route for the classic South American rally was one of the talking points of this season, with the event putting itself forward as a test case for the return of the endurance style event favoured by FIA president Jean Todt.
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Todt himself was a co-driver from 1966 to 1981, back in the heyday of the agonisingly-long rallies. I actually have a copy of Automobile Year 1981-1982 (despite my being born in 1986), and looking at the results from the 1981 rally season, there were some real doozies - even the shortest rally, Finland (448 competitve kiloemtres), was longer than every rally on the calendar. The longest was Argentina at 1370 competitive kilometres (I'm not counting the Safari, which was over 4500km, due to its unique format).

Could it be that Jean Todt is pushing for the return of these monster events? If so, count me in - the TV-friendly formats meant we have lost some truly fantastic stages over the years. I still remember the 45km epic that was Wellington Dam in Western Australia. I think we saw the beginnings of this trend with this year's Wales Rally, which saw cars taking on stages that were as far away from Cardiff as they could be and still staying within Wales. Now we've got an extended Rally Argentina. Hopefully we'll get longer rallies from 2013.
 
If you had told me a day ago that Lotus was going to enter the WRC and that they were going to use an Exige, I would have laughed at you. But now we've got pictures to prove the project exists. The Exige R-GT will appear at all tarmac events on the 2012 calendar, but homologation may be delayed until April.
 
Subaru will be returning to rallying - possibly with the upcoming BRZ model - but they will be contending the IRC. Since the BRZ and the Toyota GT86 are essentially the same car, the GT86 could also probably enter the IRC. But it makes no sense to have them compete against one another, so I wonder if Toyota could return to the WRC, running a GT86 under SWRC regulations (or even WRC if it can be managed).

I actually suspect that the IRC will not last much longer. They're having trouble retaining events from year to year, and a lot of their drivers are going elsewhere; for instance, Citroen are giving Thierry Neuville a limited WRC program of nine rallies in 2012. Peugeot are also said to be having a minimal presence in the IRC this year, and Skoda are owned by Volkswagen whose attention will soon shift to the Polo R WRC. So if you want to go rallying at an international level, the WRC might be your only choice. Once Loeb is beaten or retires, I think we'll see a whole host of entries.

Anyway, the BRZ and the GT86 would make for fantastic-looking rally cars:

Subarubrz.jpg


2012-Toyota-FT-86-side-view-pics.jpg


It's also known as the Scion FR-S:

SCion_FRS_110421_605_nyias.jpg


Where do I sign up to drive one?
 
prisonermonkeys
Since the BRZ and the Toyota GT86 are essentially the same car, the GT86 could also probably enter the IRC. But it makes no sense to have them compete against one another, so I wonder if Toyota could return to the WRC, running a GT86 under SWRC regulations (or even WRC if it can be managed).
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Toyota have been considering a WRC return for a while now but with the Auris or Yaris.

btw entry list for the Monaco rally will be revealed Jan 2nd but some info on what it contains is here: http://www.best-of-rallylive.com/en/2011/12/28/an-89-strong-entry-for-the-rallye-monte-carlo/
 
So eerrrrm, where do I watch WRC in the USA? It isnt on Speed or ESPN as far as I'm aware...

Romain Dumas? That should be good.
 
hawkeye122
So eerrrrm, where do I watch WRC in the USA? It isnt on Speed or ESPN as far as I'm aware...

Romain Dumas? That should be good.
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YouTube is where you can watch it in the USA. The channel WRCForeva is where I watched all the ESPN UK coverage every night of the rallies. Very good channel for everything WRC.
 
Furinkazen
Mini on it, shame about Meeke's absence...
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Ya, such a pity Chris is put aside, looked really promising in 2011, I wonder if he'll stay with Mini...
 
Who is this Paulo Nobre guy? He's registered as a Priority-1 driver, but I can find no information on who he is.
 
prisonermonkeys
Who is this Paulo Nobre guy? He's registered as a Priority-1 driver, but I can find no information on who he is.
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from what I found, he drives one of the BMW X-Raid X3s in the Dakar Rally. Here is his webpage.

Also found this too.

Looks like he is fairly well backed as a driver too.
 
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That's interesting that Nobre is going to Monte Carlo. Nasser al-Attiyah is running a third works DS3 this year, but he's not going to Monte Carlo because the date clashes with the Dakar Rally; he'll start the season in Sweden. But then, al-Attiyah is the defending Dakar champion.
 
It doesnt look like Nobre is doing the dakar according to the X-Raid site. He really isnt one of their top drivers in raids.
 
lilcat89
It doesnt look like Nobre is doing the dakar according to the X-Raid site.
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He can't do Dakar - he's entered in Rallye Monte Carlo, and the dates clash. Monte Carlo starts on the 17th, and even though Dakar finishes in Lima on the 15th, it's a physically-demanding race and anyone trying to get from South America to Monaco after doing it would likely experience jet lag from hell.
 
This Mini story has been going around and round and round. The latest I heard is that Mini actually put on a lot of money for the project but Prodrive wants more. Mini disagrees and told Prodrive to find a sponsor. They didn't, instead they attract pay drivers to come and now Kris Meeke is in a risk of losing the seat only because Prodrive can't find a sponsor. What the **** is this?!?
 
It's 2007 all over again - Prodrive were granted an entry to the 2008 Formula 1 grid, but their presence hinged on customer chassis being permitted. Several teams disliked that idea enough to reject it, leaving Prodrive in the wind. They made a lot of noise about it, but they never considered the way other teams might not like the idea, and they knew that they had to get the teams to agree to it in the first place in order to be able to do it.
 
prisonermonkeys
It's 2007 all over again - Prodrive were granted an entry to the 2008 Formula 1 grid, but their presence hinged on customer chassis being permitted. Several teams disliked that idea enough to reject it, leaving Prodrive in the wind. They made a lot of noise about it, but they never considered the way other teams might not like the idea, and they knew that they had to get the teams to agree to it in the first place in order to be able to do it.
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I don't see the connection other than its Prodrive. Of course, a multiple WRC-winning team is just making noise and is not really a credible team at all. :rolleyes:

Two sides to every story is all I'm saying on this. BMW will say that Prodrive have refused to find other sponsors. Prodrive will say that BMW had promised more money and they're being left high and dry.
Probably the truth is somewhere in the middle, either way the relationship has turned rather sour at a moment of seeming success. No wonder its all about money and contracts then.
Seeing as Prodrive were pretty happy to sort out sponsorship all those previous times..I find it rather hard to believe that they weren't prepared to find more sponsors if necessary.
 
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I'm well aware of who Prodrive are. But what I'm seeing is a team who made plans for Formula 1 with no contingency in mind should their plans proven untenable. Now I'm seeing a team who made plans for the WRC with no contingency in mind should their plans proven untenable. I don't think that's coincidence.
 
I really don't see how you can have a contingencey for your main backer deciding to pull out other than to start searching for sponsors and money.
If they could have a major sponsor waiting on the sidelines to stump up the missing cash, they wouldn't leave them as a contingencey plan - they would bring them onboard immediately!

Basically you are blaming Prodrive for not finding other sponsors a month or so before the new season after BMW suddenly get wet feet.
Funnily enough, the timeframe for 2008 was also pretty short, but of course, Prodrive should already have money to replace it. This is completely ignoring that if Prodrive could find the money to do these things, they wouldn't be in these positions.

Are we going to blame Prodrive for Subaru pulling out and them being unable to compete in the WRC for a while too?
 
Uh, perhaps the could have sought out sponsors sooner? You know, to show BMW that they're not just accepting a free lunch. I'm sure that would have inspired a lot more confidence from BMW.
 
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