what was HOT and was NOT in 2009

[HSG]

HOT 2009 :
The battle for the title in the last round
Rally Norway, Rally Finland, Rally Poland
Petter Solberg

NOT 2009:
N.O.T
Tactics

really could not agree more!!!

also a big NOT from me would be: Wilsons "car fixing"

[Josti]

Hot:

* Right amount of rallies
* Rally Poland
* Petter Solberg
* Skoda Fabia S2000
* Title battle till the end
* Individual JWRC wins from Abbring and Weijs Jr.

Not:

* No Monte, no Sweden
* Poor line-up
* Laughable rally mileage
* Weak entry lists (Finland excluded)
* Citroën affair in Australia
* Wilson, Rautenbach, Al-Qassimi
* No win for Sordo while he could
* Lousy bonnet error for Hirvonen at GB
* Loeb winning the championship again (obviously not on him to blame)

[Francis44]

Hot:

+ Awesome wrc entry list in Portugal
+ Solberg with a C4
+ Thousands of people in Rally de Portugal
+ Rally Poland
+ Impressive Ogier pace, especially in Australia
+ Armindo Araùjo PWR champion

Not:
- Latvala mistakes
- C4 wasted on Rautenbach
- Focus wasted on Wilson

Well that's about it.

[Hartusvuori]

HOT:

+ Exciting second half of the season after how it looked at the midpoint.
+ Superb fight at Rally Norway.
+ From my personal point of view, Rally Finland. Yet again really nice four days of action, and also that Hirvonen managed to control the rally over Loeb for once. Not to forget Ketomaa's debut in WRC.
+ Latvala's win in Sardinia.
+ Sordo's and Ogier's paces in gravel.
+ Petter Solberg World Rally Team. He's much about publicity, but you've got to admit he's still commited to the sport.
+ WRR and WRC.com's result service. Even if faulty, it's still a great oppurtunity to "spectate" rallies over internet.
+ Good number of events.
+ Rally Poland - I hope it'll stay in the WRC calender in the future.
+ Skoda Fabia S2000. Wherever they are, they gather the attention. Hopefully will see a Skoda team in WRC in 2011.
+ ISC's and FIA's attempts to rescue the sport. Even if there's still lots of questions unanswered and unadressed, it must be said it's starting to look better or at least more hopeful.

NOT:

- Lack of overall competition and commited driving, especially from drivers at positions five or lower. Thanks to Loeb's mid-season mishaps this year turned out somewhat interesting, but still this level needs more competition. Hopefully that is only year or two away.
- Latvala's rollercoaster-like season. Hopefully he'll be able to forget this year since when under a lot of stress after previous mistake he's clearly not able to drive as fast as he's previously shown (ie. Friday at Finland).
- Tactics at the last stages of Friday and/or Saturday. Hirvonen's cock-up at Acropolis is an epitome of how it should not be done. Also Australia's 5+ kms of (asphalt) stages after next days running order is decided leaves a stupid aftertaste.
- And while some people feel awfully bad about tactics at the same time they are sure that rally have transformed into a team sport where lead driver should win every time. May the fastest win - as it happened now. Ideals and reality hardly ever match, but sometimes the rhetoric is just too paradoxal to undertand or accept.
- Henning Solberg: "Sabotasje!" He would be entertaining if he wouldn't be so annoying.
- Absence of Atkinson, Galli, Aava and Andersson.

Hopefully there'll be at least the same number of WRC entrants next season so it'd make a decent burial year for this stage of the sport.

I also find myself really happy that N.O.T. started this thread since this is pretty much the first time I hear something constructive from you and even seem to agree with you a lot in this case.

[ShiftingGears]

One definite NOT for me was Atkinson only driving in one rally. What the hell was he doing for the whole year?

[Tomi]

so what did you like from this year championship

- Loebs 6th championship
- the final round and the flat out battle
- Ogiers performance on his first wrc season
- Sordos pace on some gravel events and his improvement
- Rally polands stages
- Novikovs mental attitude
- the fact that the best driver won at the end

what i didn't like

- Fords and Citroens tactics
- Solbergs constant whinning and excuses
- Latvalas accidents lost us a 3rd title challenger
- Loebs accidents gave a chance to hirvonen to win a championsip by quitting to 2nd places and not driving on most events
- the sick dog championships of PWRC and JWRC and their paper useless champs with no future
- the performances of Rautenbach and Wilson in top eqquipment
- Novikovs crashes

Agree on every point, except the PWRC and JWRC thing, this year the lineup was not very good, but the drivers gets good experience from world rallies, and learn about the stages, get good notes, kind of investment in the future.

[N.O.T]

Agree on every point, except the PWRC and JWRC thing, this year the lineup was not very good, but the drivers gets good experience from world rallies, and learn about the stages, get good notes, kind of investment in the future.

i agree that the pwrc and the jwrc are good experience for the drivers the problem is that the drivers who are in them don;t have any future nomatter the experience they get...

[Tomi]

i agree that the pwrc and the jwrc are good experience for the drivers the problem is that the drivers who are in them don;t have any future nomatter the experience they get...

Yes, the competition is tough, but if does well there they get test possibilities with WRC teams, those tests are more important for the future, like Nikara now in GB a few ok stages, next week he gets to test with Prodrive.

[Josti]

i agree that the pwrc and the jwrc are good experience for the drivers the problem is that the drivers who are in them don;t have any future nomatter the experience they get...

I don't like to be bias, but Abbring at age 20, is showing some promise and has good backing too.

[jens]

Hot:
- Hirvonen
- P. Solberg managing to keep his career going despite being out of drive/team before 2009.

Not:
- Latvala
- only two manufacturers, competition continually getting worse each year.