http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature...&v=k88O5zxEiM0
P.S. At least, he has to be careful when driving on liaison roads :rolleyes: .
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature...&v=k88O5zxEiM0
P.S. At least, he has to be careful when driving on liaison roads :rolleyes: .
Volkswagen says it has developed a detailed engine map for Mexico that limits loss of performance without endangering the stability of the turbocharger.
The above quote is from the story on wrc.com about VW's altitude preparation. This confirms everything I suggested (and more) has been done. :)
Ladies and Gents. - the game has just changed!
Too not take PR talk too seriously. When they do not prepare special map for Mexico, then they are going to destroy their engines on Day1
There are also other issues there. Namely fuel pressure (or under-pressure in the fuel tank), engine or brake cooling etc.
Ostberg fastest so far on free practice: 4.12.1
So do Citroen and M-Sport have altitude chambers at their facilities?
At least they have plenty of experience. Despite that remember M-Sport fiasco from maybe 2009 (I don't remember exactly) or exclusion of Nasser caused by the fuel tank under-pressure (better to say the cheat was used to prevent the problem). When Škoda was first time there it also went bad. Hänninen had some minor issues with fuel pressure but thanks to new fuel tank he finished. Kruuda with older spec private car was not so lucky and his fuel pump stuck sucking vapor of boiled fuel.
Provisional times from free practice:
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BEw2VaCCQAAbn83.jpg:large
Block during free practice:
http://distilleryimage4.instagram.co...0a1fbdaa_7.jpg
So Mirek would you expect that VW wil have addressed the fuel issues?Quote:
Originally Posted by Mirek
I don't know. At least they were sure warned so I guess they tried to be prepared :)
Quote:
Originally Posted by Kielder
Do you have a link for the site with the results?
From Citroen twitter. If correct that a hell of a difference from Ogier.
Free practice 2: 1 Ogier 4:02.7 - 2@MikkoWRC 05.7 - 3 @ChrisAtko & Latvala 07.4 - 5 @DaniSordo 07.9…@BenitoGuerra 18.1 #WRC
No, I haven't. I took the images from Twitter accounts. :)Quote:
Originally Posted by Sprocket
Ah thanks for posting!Quote:
Originally Posted by Kielder
Qualifying times should be shown here for those who want to follow them:
WRC - Rally Mexico - Positions, Information, Videos and Photos live from the Rally Mexico | Best of Rally Live by Michelin |
First car I think runs in about an hour at 17:23 UK time
NO update from the link I posted, but Ogier through qualifying with 4:01.1 on hard tyres. Ford and Citroen on Softs.
Updates coming through now,
Mikko fastest so far in qualifying 3.2 ahead of Ostberg, Ogier currently in 3rd +3.9 to Mikko :D
Let the fun begin!
1 Hirvonen DS3 WRC 3’57’2 2 Novikov Fiesta WRC 3’57’9 3 Ostberg Fiesta WRC 4’00’4 4 Neuville Fiesta WRC 4’00’4 5 Ogier Polo R WRC 4’01’1 6 Sordo DS3 WRC 4’01’2 7 Latvala Polo R WRC 4’01’5 8 Guerra DS3 WRC 4’09’4 9 Prokop Fiesta WRC 4’12’2 10 Kosciuszko Mini WRC 4’14’2
What was the logic of VW running hard tyres in a 6.27 km qualifying stage? Looks like a mistake to me!
Is the starting gap between the cars enough to allow the dust to dissipate between them or will there still be bad dust hanging in the air in sheltered sections ?
At shakedown gap between cars was 3min, is it enough for longer stages?
saving a set of softs for the future may be...Quote:
Originally Posted by Sprocket
Yeah maybe, seems to be a high cost to pay though in Mexico where sweeping is so important. From WRC.ComQuote:
Originally Posted by oyunbozan
Hirvonen:
“It was a good clear drive, so I just need to try to do that on all the stages,”said Hirvonen. “Everything worked perfectly. I was maybe a little surprised that some people went on a hard tyre but for us it worked fine so I’m happy with my tyre choice.”
And Latvala:
“Soft would have been the best option,” he said. “Looking at what qualifying means for the weekend, was it clever to have run hard compound or not? I don’t know but it’s too late, we’ve done it now.”
Just seems like a bizarre choice to me. I would of thought for the longer days and stages they would want the hard tyres more than a spare set of softs, so they last longer. For the short qualifier go with softs for the grip and to hell with the wear, it can be made up by road position on the first full day. I wonder if Ogier will comment on the choice.
Where did you find the info sheet with the times from free practice?Quote:
Originally Posted by Kielder
2013 World Rally Championship leader Sébastien Ogier says he's unhappy with his Qualifying performance for Rally Mexico in which he finished fifth overall in his Polo R WRC.
Ogier will start from ninth on the road: Qualifying winner Mikko Hirvonen, who had first pick of starting positions, chose thirteenth to start in his Citroën DS3 WRC.
Ogier says the hard tyres he selected were the wrong choice, and running first through the stage was probably not an advantage:
“I am not happy with that qualifying. We had the disadvantage of having to open the stage."
"We took the safe choice with the hard tyre compound. What we didn’t expect was that there would be quite such a big difference between the hard and the soft."
"Qualifying is very important here at the Rally Mexico, in order to give yourself a good choice of starting position. We still have that."
"Our goal is to finish the rally and get a good result. Compared to our rivals, we will have an extra set of fresh tyres to use on the special stages.”
VW teammate Jari-Matti Latvala finished seventh fastest, and will start from seventh position:
“Obviously the soft tyres have produced the better times in qualifying, while we opted for the harder compound."
"At first glance, starting from seventh does not look ideal. However, we will have to wait and see how the rally pans out – it could ultimately be an advantage to have more hard tyres left. After all, the number of tyres is restricted to 28."
"Our priority remains to use our first gravel rally to close the gap on our rivals in terms of experience with the Polo. We can only do that if we complete the full distance."
"As there are a lot of stones and rocks lurking on the stages of the Rally Mexico, we concentrated hard on documenting these perils very precisely in our pace notes during our preparations. We feel well prepared and are looking forward to the spectacular start in Guanajuato’s old town.”
They are confident they can beat the weak opposition despite starting order when they have a set more of softs.Quote:
Originally Posted by Sprocket
“It probably wasn’t the ideal choice for this stage. We’ll see whether it was a good idea or not to tyre to look after my allocation of hard and soft tyres for the rest of the weekend,” observed Sébastien Ogier (5th) who seemed a little jumpy :D after qualifying.Quote:
Originally Posted by Sprocket
I'm thinking maybe from what is being said here and from the driver quotes, they thought they would take qualifying on hard, then run more of the SS on softs?? It's the only logic I can see to it.
That backfired then.
True Mikko had better start position for qualifying, more reason then for VW to go with soft not hard, but now Mikko is just where he needs to be. Looking on WRC.com he has is smile back, happy Mikko = fast Mikko :D
From Mr Block, something to enjoy while we wait for SS1... :)
http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8229/8...6d872568_z.jpg
Shakedown & QS pics:
rallysport.hu - Rally GTO Mexico 2013 - shakedown
Thats some idea of how rough the stages will be ! :eek:
http://www.rallysport.hu/images/2013...to_002_jpg.jpg
http://youtu.be/isrYgwz9JVY
they used the last photo posted here as cover :)
Interesting shakedown, this one is going to be interesting to follow Live...
- Will Ogier provide a good performance with the Polo on this type of surface and road position?
- Starting later than Ogier, can the young Ford and Citroen drivers take the advantage? Will they be able to handle the pressure (and stay on the road) if Ogier eventually starts to pull ballistic times? They will have Ogier's splits by the time they start, and during the stage...
- Can Hirvonen finally deliver a win or a podium...? He'll be in deep trouble if he doesn't... with that road position he has to provide at least a considerable amount of stage wins.
Let's see if we get a proper old fashioned full throttle fight. Sainz has plenty of experience in that department, he surely can give some advice to Ogier on how to drive under those conditions (Resumen Rally Portugal 1998 Canal + - YouTube).