2025 British & Irish Championships

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Originally Posted by Fast Eddie WRC

He told me on FB that he did but was told it was 'Force Majeure' ..

Matt Edwards said: "Not the case these days. CofC has the authority and means to issue a fair time."

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I must say that giving back times after dust/issues of other competitors is quite interesting topic. In the past it was almost always force majeure and time was adjusted only in case car has stopped at the accident. But then FIA stewards started in WRC events with adjusting times after almost each issue of previous competitor. From my point of view too many times. And I know that also inside FIA there is "discussion war" about adjusting or not adjusting the time and it is not clear, which version has more supporters. For sure now we have split times (WRC/ERC), we have onboard cameras etc. Another big issue is completely wrong starting order on WRC/ERC events, which is not based on speed of drivers, but order in championship, making groups of same car etc. Personally I was always against adjusting the time in case you catch any car on the stage - for me it is part of competition. Only where I agree with giving notional time is when crew stop at the scene of accident or receive red flag.

The issue for me is that the costs are now so high to buy and run a top Rally2 Car that losing time and positions through no fault of your own is very harsh. This is particularly so when a driver and team are fighting to win a Championship.

Also 'force majeuer' should mean issues outside of anyones anyone's control. Was this really ? And why wasnt Williams told to pull over knowing a car would be due right behind him after he rejoined ?

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Originally Posted by Fast Eddie WRC

The issue for me is that the costs are now so high to buy and run a top Rally2 Car that losing time and positions through no fault of your own is very harsh. This is particularly so when a driver and team are fighting to win a Championship.

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I dont agree that costs to buy and run Rally2 car are so high comparing to the top cars in the past...

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Originally Posted by Fast Eddie WRC

The issue for me is that the costs are now so high to buy and run a top Rally2 Car that losing time and positions through no fault of your own is very harsh. This is particularly so when a driver and team are fighting to win a Championship.

Also 'force majeuer' should mean issues outside of anyones anyone's control. Was this really ? And why wasnt Williams told to pull over knowing a car would be due right behind him after he rejoined ?

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The costs these days are no higher in real terms than they have been in the past. Top level rallying has always been costly.

It's force majeur when it's outside of the control of the event. Cars having punctures or going off and losing time and then re-starting is not within the control of anyone running the event.

Would you care to explain how you woulld tell a car to stop and let another one behind pass in a forest with poor mobile phone coverage (even the tracking signals were intermittant) and when crews may have their phones off to avoid distractions while running on the stage - and that's assuming that anyone in HQ knew that Evans was being held up.

As PLuto rightly says, the actions of the Stewards on WRC events have created this attitude that sh*t doesn't happen because there's always compensation available. Well I'm sorry, but at BRC level we don't have the facilities or manpower to carry out the level of investigation that's possible in the WRC so if the CofC says it's force majeur then that's what it is.

Well if 3x BRC Champion Matt Edwards thinks the CoC can make a decision based on all the available information, I stand by my opinion.

On costs, MEM are running two top cars and fighting against WRC Team (M-Sport). It must be very hard to take when they get a result like this after all their outlay.

FB quote:
Surely with todays technology force majeur is a thing of the past?! Why couldn’t the organisers check the tracker data? Would the tracker on the car you caught have flashed up and warned them you were there?


Edwards : It is a thing of the past on most other rallies!

Carnage on SS10 on the Circuit of Ireland with 3 of the top 4 cars stopped with punctures !

Callum Devine now leads with 1 stage to go.

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Originally Posted by Fast Eddie WRC

Why couldn’t the organisers check the tracker data? Would the tracker on the car you caught have flashed up and warned them you were there?

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Evans was 30 seconds behind Williams on the road at the end of the stage!

No tracker with a proximity alert is going to give a warning at that distance. If he'd had better notes or been a bit braver he might not have lost so much time.

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Originally Posted by Steve Boyd

Evans was 30 seconds behind Williams on the road at the end of the stage!

No tracker with a proximity alert is going to give a warning at that distance. If he'd had better notes or been a bit braver he might not have lost so much time.

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The dust was pretty horrendous so that was probably as close as he could get. Also he might've expected to get the time back so didn't want to take big risks...

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Originally Posted by Fast Eddie WRC

The dust was pretty horrendous so that was probably as close as he could get. Also he might've expected to get the time back so didn't want to take big risks...

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The dust was there for everyone. If the CofC had given him an allowance, how many others would have wanted one? Jurgenson was only 30 seconds behind Evans at the end of SS2. Where did he catch up with the dust from two cars travelling together before setting a time only 2.7 seconds slower than Creighton running in clean air?

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Originally Posted by Steve Boyd

The dust was there for everyone. If the CofC had given him an allowance, how many others would have wanted one? Jurgenson was only 30 seconds behind Evans at the end of SS2. Where did he catch up with the dust from two cars travelling together before setting a time only 2.7 seconds slower than Creighton running in clean air?

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It all depends on where and when he 'caught' them and if it was in the part that was less dusty. Also Evans caught Williams earlier and ran behind him for 10 miles.