Rally Croatia 2022

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Originally Posted by wyler

it happened a year ago. crashing on the road section and escaping police too, for the same reason btw: reach start line on time.
on this side, we cannot come here at these moments and do the puritans. everybody here around knows that happens all the rounds and from many of the drivers, we also make legends on the past (like driving with codriver hanging from the window...). it just becomes a bold statement when it hit the media, and that's a bit...unfair. i didn't remember such a bold sttement last year, when there was the other "crime". but that's just because he didn't get a 1/10 on dirtfish, maybe...

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LoL I am aware of that and others, doesn't mean it was right then. if you payed attention there were people saying it's not good for the sport then as well. And I said besides the score lol I don't give 2c on dirtfish driver ratings.

Great win by Kale,btw i notice that last year Ogier in the same stage did 8.14 a way faster than this year.

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Originally Posted by spyros

Great win by Kale,btw i notice that last year Ogier in the same stage did 8.14 a way faster than this year.

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The conditions were worse this year on PS stage

On one of the saturdays dry stage, the current machines showed the same times or even faster than last year. For example Loubet was faster than last year

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Originally Posted by rp

Yes, but his driving on the road section was the reason and this was not the 1st time.

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Rumors about not even the only offense in Croatia 22 so it was only political will or pressure not to punish the team harder.

These drivers are supposedly ambassadors for the FIA's Road Safety initiative:

https://www.fia.com/fia-action-road-safety

Driving like a tool on the public highway when virtually their every move is being filmed by a dashcam or phone is just plain counter productive for all parties. Fines for multi $ salaried drivers is a minor inconvenience, hit them with points deductions otherwise there may well be a well publicised high profile RTA that is harder to sweep under the carpet than allowing Russian drivers to compete under a neutral flag.

What Neuville did at the weekend is still 'bad', no doubt about it, but compared to what went on before every car had a tracker on it, and every holier-than-thou motorist had a camera phone or dashcam?

Driving standards on road sections in the pre-tracking days (and still in national rallies without tracking) were appalling. People look back fondly on the likes of McRae, Loeb and Gronholm trying to drag damaged cars back to service, far faster than would be 'safe' and in completely unroadworthy condition, and those guys are heroes. Neuville breaks the speed limit on a practically empty dual carriageway and, to some, he's the devil.

Ultimately, as long as there's a sporting reason to break the speed limit on public roads, drivers will do it. Until last weekend, there had never been a sporting penalty for a road section offence - even Ogier only got a fine for having an actual RTA, driving his car at a police officer and then speeding / running red lights in Zagreb (which as mentioned was the same reason Neuville broke the speed limit on Friday). I think this sets a dangerous precedent, and opens the door to teams pointing the finger at each others' drivers for any minor indiscretion on road sections - dangerous driving is dangerous driving, isn't it?

I hope Hyundai follow through with their appeal, and are successful.

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Originally Posted by seb_sh

LoL I am aware of that and others, doesn't mean it was right then. if you payed attention there were people saying it's not good for the sport then as well. And I said besides the score lol I don't give 2c on dirtfish driver ratings.

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lol, read better.
never said it was right. just that is a bit funny that people pretend to be surprised or indignant, and also that once in a while become a big issue when almost all the time is not a big deal, while we all know that happens regularly and fia knows every inch of the race via gps system.
i don't like people taking pride of their pureness randomly once over a thousand times.

edit for clarity: not personal to you or any other in particular, just on the topic.

Great vid from J-Records like always https://youtu.be/FmsPBG3FgNU

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Originally Posted by ouvreur

What Neuville did at the weekend is still 'bad', no doubt about it, but compared to what went on before every car had a tracker on it, and every holier-than-thou motorist had a camera phone or dashcam?

Driving standards on road sections in the pre-tracking days (and still in national rallies without tracking) were appalling. People look back fondly on the likes of McRae, Loeb and Gronholm trying to drag damaged cars back to service, far faster than would be 'safe' and in completely unroadworthy condition, and those guys are heroes. Neuville breaks the speed limit on a practically empty dual carriageway and, to some, he's the devil.

Ultimately, as long as there's a sporting reason to break the speed limit on public roads, drivers will do it. Until last weekend, there had never been a sporting penalty for a road section offence - even Ogier only got a fine for having an actual RTA, driving his car at a police officer and then speeding / running red lights in Zagreb (which as mentioned was the same reason Neuville broke the speed limit on Friday). I think this sets a dangerous precedent, and opens the door to teams pointing the finger at each others' drivers for any minor indiscretion on road sections - dangerous driving is dangerous driving, isn't it?

I hope Hyundai follow through with their appeal, and are successful.

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so if something was accepted in 1990 or last year, it should still be accepted ?
rules/penalties can't change ?

Remember that Neuville did overspeed 11km´s distance. There has never been different speeding rules for "empty dual carriageways"

Speeding will never stop if they don't get any penalty.

I understand your point if penalties are lighter in future again but I hope that for now on you will get penalty every time in every rally.

and this is just FIA ruling, local police could have tighter/looser laws in every rally. FIA rule is just minimum. (in Finland you loose automatically your license if you do 130km/h in 80 zone. Jari-Matti lost his this January , Tommi 2-years ago)

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Originally Posted by ouvreur

What Neuville did at the weekend is still 'bad', no doubt about it, but compared to what went on before every car had a tracker on it, and every holier-than-thou motorist had a camera phone or dashcam?

Driving standards on road sections in the pre-tracking days (and still in national rallies without tracking) were appalling. People look back fondly on the likes of McRae, Loeb and Gronholm trying to drag damaged cars back to service, far faster than would be 'safe' and in completely unroadworthy condition, and those guys are heroes. Neuville breaks the speed limit on a practically empty dual carriageway and, to some, he's the devil.

Ultimately, as long as there's a sporting reason to break the speed limit on public roads, drivers will do it. Until last weekend, there had never been a sporting penalty for a road section offence - even Ogier only got a fine for having an actual RTA, driving his car at a police officer and then speeding / running red lights in Zagreb (which as mentioned was the same reason Neuville broke the speed limit on Friday). I think this sets a dangerous precedent, and opens the door to teams pointing the finger at each others' drivers for any minor indiscretion on road sections - dangerous driving is dangerous driving, isn't it?

I hope Hyundai follow through with their appeal, and are successful.

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i

Footage I saw of Neuville looked like a last minute undertake and dive for the slip road which would have been at least six points on my licence in the UK!

I would suspect there are far more instances of speeding and bad driving amongst members of the support caravan for major cycle races than there are on any WRC event or stage rally in general. The problem is we are setting our stall out with a holier than thou approach with this FIA Safety program and yet tacitly accepting that drivers may have to "speed" to catch up time. There are many eyes watching all aspects of motorised sport hoping for an opportunity to highlight its shortcomings and I can guarantee in my own country that the media would rather pick on this type of incident rather than cover the actual rally in their sports sections.