[IRC] 2009 Rallye Monte Carlo - official thread

[urabus-denoS2000]

Great rally,better than any WRC in the last few years!!!!

Great coverage,great competition,lots of thrills!!!!!!

And who watched the coverage will agree that Kopecky on Col de Turini was spectacular!!!!!!!!!!!

Congratulations to Sebastien Ogier and Julien Ingrassia for their deserved victory!

[urabus-denoS2000]

But for me the most impressive was Kopecky,7/14 stages without working power steering and finished 4th...........



And he was by far the most spectacular

[AndyRAC]

The sad thing is that next year it is back in the WRC - what format will it be? They surely can't go back to the usual WRC format, or can they?
How interesting has this event been? The only 'downer' would be the lack of a fight on the final night - but that's Rallying, and the Monte.

[bluuford]

Yeah great coverage! So, I hope that Eurosport will be global distributor for WRC as well. Anyway, I have never liked Monte rally and this time was no different, nothing really exciting. Nearly nothing happened after stage 1 in leg 3. Gaps were huge like usual or even bigger than usual (thanks to the weather). Gaps from 5 place were nearly two times bigger compared to last year. So, at the end it was just a teamwork and fast driving for Sarrazin to keep Jan behind.

[dimviii]

Congrats to Ogier also from me.Well done with clever driving avoiding risks.
Impressed from fabias speed out of the box.Something not easy for teams even with unlimited budget.
Impressed also from Sarrazins speed.All the ss he won(5?) were with BIG difference from second fastest crew.
Good pace also from Loix,isn t easy afer too many years to be competitive with young guns(see Auriol)
About abarth now,as i am remember must be the only time in rallying to see them not competetive.They have to try much harder,cause if this year again with no results(even with the newcomer fabia) you never know what they are going to decide the marketing department(specially in crunch credit times...)
finally wrc seems to be completely amateurs in organization terms.
Must try much more harder than abarth :

[Cloverleaf]

First response:Atkinson interested in IRC drive
http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/72974

[Alvaro_Rally]

During these three days of Monte I´ve remembered why I love rallies!

Fantastic conditions and fantastic stages avoiding the weekend and coming back to the night...

And of course, great drivers and great cars. Pug is still the best car but it´s been impressive to watch Skoda´s performaces and for sure Fiat will be very competitive with little luck. And probably new brands will join...

There is so much for the FIA and ISC to learn!

[wotaguy]

how many budding rallydrivers are about to change thier name to seb!!!

congrads, very mature drive, shows what a talent he is, but skoda will come away from this with huge confidence, they were awesome, bring on round 2, coverage was fantastic, and i love the monte, as its so unpredicatable

[Tom206wrc]

I don't think the Pug was really the best, I'd say it's equal with the Fabia, all what really played in Monte was choice of tires at the best moment...


But for the future, as Peugeot fan, I'll fear the Skoda...

[urabus-denoS2000]

Tom,thats the spirit we are all looking for!!!!