Originally Posted by scn
Bring back Corsica and San Remo.
No asphalt rally has the flavour of Corsica, even now that is in IRC. I have been in Rally d' Alsace, Rally of Germany, Catalunia and I can say that all of them fall behind Corsica by far. Surely, because of their location they have more spectators, but once you have seen just one Corsican special stage you realize that "asphalt rallying=Corsica". Period.
Also, I have been in Sardinia and I like it a lot, but old asphalt-gravel San Remo in Tuscany was something else. Rallying is not just special stages. It is also the atmosphere, the environment and the character that an event must have.
Regarding US, for God's sake, no, no, no. Rallying is simply out of the American culture and, most important, totally out of the culture of American car industry. Back in the '80s FIA tried it and it was a total failure. There were whole special stages without a single spectator. Even the empty stages of Turkey and Mexico could be called crowded in comparison to the ones in US.