News from France

[Tom206wrc]

Stéphane Chambon back in rallying in full french gravel championship with a Citroën DS3 R5

This week-end in Normandie a great entrylist for the Rallye de la Côte fleurie
There's also the Rallye des Routes du Nord with a few drivers from UK(Sébastian Ling)and Belgium

[Tom206wrc]

British driver Gary Pearson in the french Peugeot 208 Cup this season

[vino_93]

So, this week end was the first big in France with La Côte Fleurie and Les Routes du Nord.

In Normandy (Côte Fleurie), Brunson invited Cuoq and Roché to warm up for tarmac season. Moreover there was other good drivers, as Pruvot (Impreza S8), Ragues (DS3 R5), Pustelnik (208 T16) and of course Cédric Robert (Lancer Evo VII). Weather was really bad, with rain, a bit of snow, lot of winds ... so it was a difficult warm-up for both Roché and Brunson with their Fiesta WRC. Cuoq easily win.


Clear drive for Ragues too, who finished 2nd. 3rd is Brunson, after a small mistake.



1 Jean-Marie Cuoq (C4 WRC)
2 Pierre Ragues (DS3 R5) 3'16
3 Eric Brunson (Fiesta WRC) 3'41
4 Stéphane Pustelnik (208 T16) 5'14
5 Cédric Robert (Lancer VII) 5'32
6 Pierre Roché (Fiesta WRC) 6'23
...

Difficult was Les Routes du Nord too ... first, the level wasn't really good. In fact, the worst since a lot of year. Bayard with his Corolla WRC was the favourite. His main opponent was Depoortere with the S12, but he has problem with the car, and retire a lot of time ... Then we can talk about Deraedt (Celica ST205), Saint Requier (207 S2000) but against WRC, it's hard to win there. Only three outsiders : welsh Ling (Lancer X R4), and belgians Pyck (Lancer IX) and Verstaen (Astra). Both were good, but only Verstaen finished (6th, 1st F2/14).
Bayard had a lot of troubles with its Corolla this week end, but he achieve another win (9 on 10 rallies last year, with one in Belgium). He is the most successful driver in french cup from nowadays.
Deraedt finished at a good 2nd place, and can be clearly consider as a top contender for the final of the french cup, whereas Saint Requier achieved a 3rd place, which is good for his first race with the 207 S2000 (and first race with a 4WD). He owns one of the last 207 S2000 chassis (ex Vanneste).





1 Laurent Bayard (Corolla WRC)
2 Sébastien Deraedt (Celica ST205) 1'00
3 Yves Saint-Requier (207 S2000) 2'42
4 Johan Vanson (Lancer VIII) 3'29
5 Cédric Lemaire (Lancer VIII) 7'23
6 Christophe Verstaen (BEL, Opel Astra) 8'18

[nafpaktos]

Nice report!these two rallies are for two different cups?

[vino_93]

No, both of them are for French Cup.
French Cup is a global competition. Each event in France (except gravel) count for it, even french tarmac championship round. Only WRC, RRC and GT+ are banned from this competition (that mean they can't take point, but they can start, except the smallest events called "régional").
You take point as in french championship, that mean 10 - 8 - 6 - 5 ... for the overall classification, and same for your class. So the winner of a rally take 20 points. Then each race has a coefficient, depending on its length or its status. Both of them where coeff 4, so the highest outside of french D2 champ, so f.e. Dereadt and Ragues took 80 pts in total (as Bayard is transparent).
The points you take will help you to qualify for the final. There's a classification per comity, and you take points where you have your licence (it's more or less the same comities as our "régions", so for example Provence Alpes Côte d'Azur, even if some are merged, like both Normandy together or Nord-Pas-de-Calais - Picardie).
Each comity has a number of invited drivers, depending on the level of the driver, the number of guys, a.s.o ...
Moreover to qualify, you have to take part to a definite number of rally in your comity (otherwise it would be too easy to come in a small comity to qualify, but Ile de France is this kind of thing, as they don't organize a rally... so each year some drivers who absolutely want to qualify for the final take their license there).

This year the final will be in Samer (close to Boulogne sur Mer, so close to UK and Belgium, if some fans want to travel to see it). Last year it was La Rochelle, and for 2016 there was strong indications for Corsica, but that was before the come-back of Giru di Corsica in WRC.

[Tom206wrc]

A really nice pre-entrylist for the Rallye du Touquet
http://ewrc-results.com/startlist.ph...de-Calais-2015

[nafpaktos]

Each comity has a number of invited drivers, depending on the level of the driver, the number of guys, aso...

Explanation please.The invited drivers where they come from and what they gain?

Moreover to qualify, you have to take part to a definite number of rally in your comity (otherwise it would be too easy to come in a small comity to qualify, but Ile de France is this kind of thing, as they don't organize a rally... so each year some drivers who absolutely want to qualify for the final take their license there).

As you say Ile de France dont organize rally,so how is possible someone to get qualified without participate to rallies.i suppose i dont understand something.

[vino_93]

1/ I mean, each comity has a number of crews to send to the final. So for example, the organizing comity (Nord-Pas de Calais) has 16 crews invited. Poitou Charentes has 8 drivers qualified (due to the number of classified drivers in the comity last year) + a bonus of 3, because the winner of 2014 was from there, a.s.o...
So you have to be, you have a license from the Nord, in the Top 16 of the comity to take part to the final (in a situation where everyone wants to go to the final, of course you can refuse to go, and someone else will have your place).


2/ you can take point on all french rallies, but you are classified only in your comity. But to be eligible for the finale, you have to take part to a definite number of events in your comity (depending on the number of rallies there).
But, in Ile de France there's no rally. So guys take point where they want, and doesn't need to go there to race at least one.
So each guys take the license in Ile de France, because it is easier for them to qualify, as Ile de France doesn't have a lot of local drivers. Most of the time, these drivers are from the comity which organize the finale, because everyone wants to be part of it there.



I just notice there has been a change in the point system. Now it's 5-4-3-2-1 for overall, and 15-12-9-7-5 for class. So still 20 points for the winner of the rally, but less for overall classification.

[nafpaktos]

Thanks a lot!

[Tom206wrc]

Sébastien Loeb will run the Rallye d'Epernay Vins de Champagne by the end of march !!!

He will drive of course the PH Sport DS3 WRC, and even if his codriver remains unknown, I bet it'll be his wife again