2008 Acropolis Rally - official thread

Another glorious win for Loeb as per new FIA's road position rule plan :s tare: ... and one Greece rally Ford won't pocket, for a change. ;)

Citroën is closing on the manu champ, it wasn't expected at all there. Will be interesting for the 2nd part of the season after the Ford ballad in Finland.

I'm a bit surprised at how Loeb and Quesnel insist quite a lot about the new C4 suspension improvements made after Mexico.
Sordo still has to learn how to deal with both speed and tire wear.
Refreshing to see a Sub so high in the final classification despite average pace and thanks to attrition.
Too bad for Henning and i don't see any Ford dirty trick to let Hirvonen clinch a podium and get more pilot's and manu points. :talk:
Pleased by Aava, want to see more from him.
Last, Suzuki guys' comittment eventually rewarded them for a couple of manu points. It's a bit of something in Greece. :up:




Russia, 2008 IIHF World Champion ! :bounce:

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Originally Posted by Viking

And rally winner is.....Red Bull.... :)

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+Top 2 in PWRC
RedBull gives you wings!

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Originally Posted by Tomi

Does anyone know what the driving order if both S1600 and PWRC is in the same event?

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NORF2008 = JWRC first and PWRC after
PWRC will use numbers 131-160
from http://www.nesteoilrallyfinland.fi/a...9-45-59253.pdf page 22 in finish
11. Yleistä kilpailun kulusta
11.1 Kilpailunumerot Prioriteetti 3 -ohjaajille
Junioreiden MM-sarjan kilpailijat käyttävät JWRC-sääntöjen Artiklan 9 mukaisia kilpailunumeroitaan. Tuotantoautojen MM-sarjan kilpailijat käyttävät normaaleita numeroitaan lisättynä sadalla, eli numeroita 131 - 160.
11.2 Lähtöjärjestys Prioriteetti 3 -ohjaajille
Prioriteetti 3 -ohjaajien lähtöjärjestyksessä Junioreiden MM-sarjan ohjaajat lähtevät ennen Tuotantoautojen MM-sarjan ohjaajia.

Seriously, who wants to see S1600 cars ??? :down:

Why not AFF? Spectacular they are specially if they are driven from talented hotshots! To tell you the truth I would like to see both PWRC and JWRC in the same rally!

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Originally Posted by kleisj

Why not AFF? Spectacular they are specially if they are driven from talented hotshots! To tell you the truth I would like to see both PWRC and JWRC in the same rally!

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That's the problem. One out of thirty and you might see a talented hotshot who serves the car right.

I prefer PWRC. That's where the talent lurks novadays :)

Oh and btw kleisj.

Thanks for the good reports and photos during Acropolis :up:

and same in english from NORF homepage
11. Features of the Rally
11.1 Competition Numbers for Priority 3 Drivers
Competitors in the FIA Junior WRC will be using their regular competition numbers as per Art. 9 in FIA JWRC regulations. The competitors in FIA Production Car WRC will be using a competition number equal to their regular PWRC number plus 100, i.e. competitor numbers 131 to 160.
11.2 Starting Order for Priority 3 Drivers
Among the Priority 3 drivers, competitors in the FIA Junior WRC start before Production WRC crews.

Acropolis is over and I think the officials should seriously consider to move the event to the previous location with all these beautiful stages! It was good for me to sleep home every night but still this is not a reason I would vote for the rally to stay at the present location!
The stages were very rough! Worse than last year. This doesn't help for flat out driving. Tactic gets in the way for survival!

Good Seb got it! He was fast , smart and lucky! Bravo to him because he know the way to the top better than anyone else right now.
Hirvo I believe has better tactics from his team mate. Or better luck ? I don't know. But he is still in better championship position. Fast and always nice to watch him.
Latvala reminds me a bit of McRae. Flat out all time. Great to watch. When things go well he can overhaul Loeb. And this is pretty amazing , but on the other side speed is part of the factors to take a win.
I was really hoping that the two Fords take 1-2 spots. But was never to happen.
On the other hand it was great to see Peter in the number 2 position. Crowd went nuts when he arrived at the service on Day2. I hope the car is good enough to make a fine comeback as championship contender.
Aava was maybe the star of the rally. Magnificent drive in my opinion. Extremely spectacular wherever I watched him. 4th position is a good result for his drive. I hope we see more of him with this car to gain more experience.
Sordo is starting to produce what he is paid for. Was good to watch , aggressive, but bad luck or maybe inexperience put him down the order. He hasn't won yet with a car full capable of winning. Is time for him to start playing his role in the championship.
Both PG and Garde were trying hard , but the car is not near yet where it should be. Too much oversteer or too much understeer. In any case too much sliding meaning loss of time. Great sound though from the yellow cars!
Mads is always aggressive and this is what we like to watch. Time will tell about his performance , but definitely he knows how to drive a WRC car. One of the most spectacular current drivers. He is young and I hope we can see him with official team car in the near future. He had his share of bad luck on Day2 with 3 punctures. In ss8 he passed with a front right puncture really fast! After a while though I heard on the radio that they were looking for him because he hadn't finished the stage. He had stopped to change it loosing lots of time in this ss (Aghii Theodori).
Vovos didn't spend much time learning the car. Drove for 1st time and he put down good times beating some wrc regulars, he could have taken a really good position at the end. But he had bad luck and had to retire. Anyway we were really happy to watch him and hope next year he will have better luck with the same kind of car.

PWRC.
Great quality of drivers. I would say that the most spectacular was Bernando Sousa. Really aggressive with the car a few cms away from disaster in more than some cases, cost him time though! Maybe Ostberg kind of driving hehehe! But he got 2nd place at the end behind his team mate! Aigner was spectacular and fast as well! Got the win at the end! Congratulation to him and his team. In general Prokop, Haninnen ofcourse, Athanasoulas, Vertunov, Arauho, Brynildsen, Al-Attiyah, Baldacci and a few others who I can't remember now were really good to watch and produced fast really fast times! I thought it will be boring to watch them but now I have a really different opinion!!!

EDIT: I forgot about Sandel. Good good, but the S2000 was never near the N4s at least at the places I watched!

During the rally I've heard many things about the tyres. They were much heavier than the Michelins and all of the crews had problems with them. Some more some less, but they all did. It is estimated that they are 8kgs more than the Michelins. Anyway in all these years I don't remember Ford having suspension failures in Acropolis rally.... I don't know any details though , but I would welcome any comments on that if someone knows.

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Originally Posted by A.F.F.

Oh and btw kleisj.

Thanks for the good reports and photos during Acropolis :up:

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No prob, I have around 600 pics from day2 and 3. Problem is how to upload all these material!!!

http://img245.imageshack.us/img245/3316/tfr612ix4.gif

I will find a way though!!!