He might be right, but I seriously doubt there will be no championship at all. Will it be affected by COVID, of course, especially early season, but as the year goes on I’m sure restrictions will ease again.Quote:
Originally Posted by T16
Printable View
He might be right, but I seriously doubt there will be no championship at all. Will it be affected by COVID, of course, especially early season, but as the year goes on I’m sure restrictions will ease again.Quote:
Originally Posted by T16
Haven't PH Sport had a C3 WRC for years which nobody has used in the WRC? I shan't hold my breath...Quote:
Originally Posted by AnttiL
It remains a mystery whether they ever had the car or not. Perhaps they were first looking for people renting the car before acquiring it from Citroen Racing, but in the end decided not to?Quote:
Originally Posted by the sniper
Well they could run a few events in New Zealand and live stream the footage back to Europe 14 days quarantine and a strong business case for NZ and we could let then in
i was thinking about NZ ,a country with little covid affect.
Potential to run at least 3 international standard events in NZ and another 2 or 3 in Australia. Travel from NZ to parts of Australia (one-way) is already possible with no quarantine period required.Quote:
Originally Posted by Mk2 RS2000
Pretty simple to run four excellent events in NZ. The present WRC event and the Whangarei APRC event in the north island and then the South Island for the Otago APRC rally and then combine the South Canterbury and the Autosport rallies for the fourth eventQuote:
Originally Posted by KiwiWRCfan
Let's start with one! :D
Yeah, let's do four events in NZ, we can have the remaining ten in Finland, we also have a good COVID-situation :D
Seriously though, one of the biggest disappointments of the WRC 2020 season for me (in addition to skipping 70th anniversary event of Rally Finland) was not going to NZ
Although I think it is a little bit utopic...I will share information that comes from the facebook of a journalist from Gran Canaria:
"The gossips tell and say that the Monza Rally may be suspended and that several team leaders of the World Rally Championship have been in direct contact with Germán Morales, organizer of the Rally Islas Canarias
It seems that Germán Morales, president of the organizing committee of the Rally Islas Canarias, has supposedly been called by Hyundai Motorsport team leader Andrea Adamo, and M-Sport team manager Malcom Wilson to be interested in coming to compete in Gran Canaria and that in the He will do so in the next few hours if not the Toyota Gazoo Racing team boss Tommi Makkinen has already done so to come to Gran Canaria.
We are still waiting for official confirmation. And up to here we can write and share information."
Crazy stuff, but nothing surprises me this year.Quote:
Originally Posted by 106 sport
Adamo has it right:
"When people say to me: 'Are you happy with the calendar?' I say which f***ing calendar ?"
https://dirtfish.com/rally/wrc/hyund...dar-disruption
https://dirtfish.com/rally/wrc/qa-yv...-wrc-calendar/
Interesting interview with Matton concerning next season.
Polish media say Robert Kubica is probably back in WRC for 2021 with Hyundai. There was a meeting and both Kubica with his sponsor Orlen and Hyundai and really into it.
https://www.przegladsportowy.pl/moto...ow-wrc/xkm79lf
Looks like there will be closer to 10 Hyundai drivers 2021 :)Quote:
Originally Posted by Portimao
Know it's more for 2022 and for now it's just words but we can always hope: https://dirtfish.com/rally/wrc/austr...rc-2022-slots/
Also a reasonable explanation to why Colin Clark's idea of five rallies down under to start the 2021 season wouldn't work out. The organizers cannot commit to anything right now because of tight restrictions.Quote:
Originally Posted by Eli
Ogier stays for 2021! https://www.wrc.com/en/news/season-2...IS_55rYhsZNXNo
Ogier confirmed
https://i.ibb.co/CmgppgR/CE095529-18...C4-B814-C3.jpg
im sure he will stay also for 2022, lol
how many years he has talked about retirement now? 3-4?
Yeah, makes sense considering this year...hopefully we'll get more than six rallies to see them battle it out for the title.Quote:
Originally Posted by Tom K
I think it was strongly rumored first in the end of 2017, and the two-year Citroen deal from 2019 to 2020 was supposed to be his last deal.Quote:
Originally Posted by EstWRC
I doubt he stays for 2022 because the cars will be new.
It’s Evans they need to get signed up!
(Someone’s going to tell me he’s on a multi year deal aren’t they!)
Two years.Quote:
Originally Posted by T16
+ option.Quote:
Originally Posted by AnttiL
Something to discuss during 2021.
https://www.rallye-magazin.de/wrc/ar...klassen-45462/
Hybridization of Rally2, Rally3, Rally4 and Rally5.
Fabrizio Zaldivar in WRC3 2021 with Hyundai i20 R5
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/En3kcLvX...jpg&name=large
all year with R5 or later part with new i20 N Rally2 ?Quote:
Originally Posted by Andre Oliveira
Volkswagen Motorsport
@volkswagenms
Pooling strengths for the electric offensive: The Volkswagen Motorsport GmbH workforce will be integrated in Volkswagen AG.
https://twitter.com/volkswagenms/sta...01822448873472
They announced that Audi will run on next Dakar with electric car just yesterday. Su dunno what this actually means.Quote:
Originally Posted by dimviii
Dr. Frank Welsch, a member of the Volkswagen Board of Directors, announced the closure of the brand's racing department and the consequent transfer of 169 employees to the manufacturer's facilities in Wolfsburg to dedicate themselves to the development area. He pointed out that the Volkswagen brand as such is heading to become a reference in regards to the electricity market and hence they made the decision to dispense with their sports activities since there are no strengths that adapt to the new business vision.Quote:
Originally Posted by mknight
This move within the Volkswagen Group means the end of the ID.R project, the electric prototype conceived for the 2018 Pikes Peak. Presumably all the technology involved in the car will be transferred to the brand's commercial cars. In the statement it can be read that the supply of spare parts for the Polo GTI R5 and the Golf GTI TCR will be assured in the long term, although the production of the Polo GTI R5 customer sports for rally will end this year. This announcement from Volkswagen was to be expected after the statement issued by Audi Sport yesterday regarding competing in the Dakar and facing the World Endurance Championship with an LMDh.
Last year, Volkswagen Group indicated that its sports division would focus on electric propulsion and months later they confirm that it will disappear, which suggests that the competition area will be defended by Audi, while the position regarding Porsche is awaited. With the closure of Volkswagen Motorsport a vacuum is created in terms of factory support in the categories of rally, rallycross and touring cars, in these cases we would also have to wait for the reactions of those involved in the programs.
In the words of Dr. Frank Welsch:
We have decided to discontinue our own motorsport activities. The deep technical expertise of the employees as well as the knowledge gained from the ID.R project will remain with the company and help us develop more efficient models. My sincere thanks to all employees for the many victories, titles and records around the world and their personal commitment.
https://www.diariomotor.com/competic...e-operaciones/
That Audi is not fully electric, it has TFSI petrol engine also.Quote:
Originally Posted by mknight
So they worked hard to build a competitive car, found many buyers, many who wanted to buy one and after two years will finish the project and all the developments probably also? This car will soon fall behind.
Well...what would you say about it when they closed down their WRC operation after spending probably a large sum of development for a WRC car that never saw the light of day....Quote:
Originally Posted by Tarmop
VW officially to fully become the soulless white goods division of VW Group. Thanks for the memories of glory days VW, have fun playing the Tesla game...
If i remember correctly, techincal solutions someway did, in VW WRX outfit.Quote:
Originally Posted by Eli
Anyway, that is their minus, they opted for customer racing and those customers now have still quite new cars, chassis no. 1 being the oldest, dating back to 10.2018... not to be developed any further, opposition on the otherhand...
Funny that almost on the same day, Audi announces they are leaving FE and commit to two race series, using combustion engines ( WEC and Dakar).Quote:
Originally Posted by dimviii
Why Adamo gave Huttunen a second Hyundai chance
Hyundai Motorsport team principal details Jari Huttunen's current arrangement with the manufacturer
https://dirtfish.com/rally/wrc/why-a...yundai-chance/
"Second" chance? More like first. In 2017 he won the challenge and as a "reward" he got to drive the ( at that time) slowest and least reliable R5 ( on gravel at least, not counting DS3)Quote:
Originally Posted by dimviii
After struggling for a year they demoted him to testing and finally started developing it, but he only got to drive very few rallies.
It really seemed that when Adamo came his first actions were to get rid of all drivers signed by Nandan one way or another. (Paddon out and not even asked about Finland, Huttunen out of competition and to testing, Mikkelsen immediately reduced starts).
Following that start it later looked like he changed his mind a bit and started focusing on car changes and development, rather than kicking drivers. Good for Huttunen that he now get his first real chance.
Note that now for new R5, the first tests are by Tanak and Huttunen, rather than Neuville, who developed the WRC so that 3 drivers with 83 WRC wins among them all struggled with it.
Do you not like Neuville or something? A bit of a skewed way to describe it, when one of those drivers won 79 of those events and is past his best/ retired.Quote:
Originally Posted by mknight
Tanak, Neuville, Sordo and Breen will all take it in turns to test the new R5, as has been reported.
The first tests in 2016 of the 17 spec wrc car, were done by Kevin Abbring. Then Sordo and Paddon started testing it (without Thierry). Neuville was the last Hyundai driver to test that car, as he was out of contract and didn't sign a new deal until later in 2016 (there was talk he was going to Citroen or wanted to leave). Hyundai only let him drive the car after he agreed a new contract for the following two years.