Missing the rough rallies

[Mirek]

@mirek
the greek prime minister called todt to assure him that the money for the rallly was secured.so no money problem.the problem was that some people got dizzy by lotos money.its that simple.money is pretext.

Thanks, I didn't know that.

[Zeakiwi]

I remember Neil Allport said Argentina trashed the Mitsubishi Group N his team ran there.
Just rallies like Romania? where the teams run the cars on a standard high ride height might be ok or just a rule to have higher ride heights rather than like Cyprus? where Solberg's car ate stones from a low ride height.

[Mirek]

Good that You mention Sibiu. Škoda used there the highest possible setup for the cars and they had no problem with roughness of the roads (as opposed to gr.N cars and Peugeots). Check this video with Andreas Mikkelsen running on the "off road" setup of Fabia S2000. I kinda like that http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yllWUPRYNFk

[COD]

only safari would be nice to be back... the rest got what they deserved.

I don't think the Acropolis was so bad + it is a legend like the Safari. Cyprus, Turkey etc. Deserved to go

[RAS007]

I don't think the Acropolis was so bad + it is a legend like the Safari. Cyprus, Turkey etc. Deserved to go

Agreed; it would be good to have maybe one endurance type event back in the calendar; but because of cost cutting, and persistent attempts by the FIA to change the fabric of the sport, we have much more compact rallies, shorter and re-used stages, clover leaf routes to accommodate central servicing etc, so I can't see the sport ever making a return to those days, I am very sorry to say.

[Mirek]

Agreed; it would be good to have maybe one endurance type event back in the calendar; but because of cost cutting, and persistent attempts by the FIA to change the fabric of the sport, we have much more compact rallies, shorter and re-used stages, clover leaf routes to accommodate central servicing etc, so I can't see the sport ever making a return to those days, I am very sorry to say.

In my opinion Argentina stands for that one. It's longer than other events and rougher too. In these days I don't think it's wise to make it even longer. 500 km is enough.

[Koceens]

I dont miss them. Rally must be on tarmac. For rough roads there are thousands of offroad events, with machines proper for it.

There are even more thousands of racing events on tarmac and most of them are incredibly boring. Well at least watching on TV.

So I think it's a good balance now with 3-4 tarmac events per season.

[itix]

Mirek, the rally cyprus vid was really cool. If they ran those kind of stages mixed in with the slow rough stages, that would be a very interesting rally!

I think rough rallies adds to the sport and to the test the drivers face. A good rally driver should be an allrounder. This is not circuit racing where all you do is 15 corners which requires a lot less skill. At least the safari should return... it is called WORLD rally championship after all, and having 3 rallies outside Europe on a 13 event season is not really a world thing.

[lewalcindor]

Mirek, the rally cyprus vid was really cool. If they ran those kind of stages mixed in with the slow rough stages, that would be a very interesting rally!

I think rough rallies adds to the sport and to the test the drivers face. A good rally driver should be an allrounder. This is not circuit racing where all you do is 15 corners which requires a lot less skill. At least the safari should return... it is called WORLD rally championship after all, and having 3 rallies outside Europe on a 13 event season is not really a world thing.

I agree that ideally, rallying should encompass varied surfaces to test the all-around driving skills of the competitors. But it appears that the economics of the sport precludes this ideal vision of rallying from becoming a reality.

The sport doesn't appear to generate much money directly (from ticket sales, merchandise, sponsorships, broadcasting rights revenue, etc.), but costs a kings ransom to run a team or even a single car for a season. As it is, the WRC and its supporting championships are probably seen more as glorified hobbies than something in the F1 (or even NASCAR) realm. The difference here is that manufacturers and teams will pay drivers to play the F1 game because of the enormous revenues involved, while drivers in the WRC have to pay manufacturers and teams to play the game because there is comparatively little revenue or reward to be had.

I would compare competing in most auto racing championships to operating a restaurant. Many connoisseurs of racing or food would love to delve full-time into their passion. But economic realities prevent this from happening most of the time. Both involve massive overhead costs to start-up and operate over time, and most of the time, both reward their owners with a much smaller return (and often a negative return) than had the owners invested their money elsewhere.

Also, I wouldn't denigrate circuit drivers. Their goals are no different from rally drivers' goals: gaining time from their competitors from each corner and section. And in both sports, the elite drivers are the ones who can take off more time at each corner and section than their competitors can. Arguably, circuit drivers have a harder task of beating other racers because (a) the competitive field is more even than it is in rallying, and (b) there's less time lost to factors like going off-course, crashing, or puncturing your tires. That's my opinion on the matter, anyway.

[Mirek]

The real works team pay their drivers in WRC too. Even the big teams in IRC/ERC have been doing so.