Rally Discussion and Bar Talk Thread

[cali]

Lol at Colin Clark's WRC hits and misses in Motorsport News this week.

The guy has an ego the size of Hyundai's budget but the knowledge the size of M-Sport's budget.......

Please don't insult M-Sport

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[Francis44]

do you like it? I dont.
https://www.facebook.com/rallyemag/v...3061301106579/

Interesting concept technically but definitely not interesting to see and much less to ear.

Rally, to survive, has to follow alternative fuels as power sources, much like F1 is doing starting from 2025.

[Mirek]

do you like it? I dont.
https://www.facebook.com/rallyemag/v...3061301106579/

Allegedly this car has 680 Hp combined power from two motors (its power train is developed for rallycross). We have to take into account that a real electric rally car would certainly have a limited power just like all rally classes, i.e. the real one would be slower and even more dull.

Now I'm very curious how the Austrians will ballance the rules to have a fair competition with normal Rally2...

[mknight]

Allegedly this car has 680 Hp combined power from two motors (its power train is developed for rallycross). We have to take into account that a real electric rally car would certainly have a limited power just like all rally classes, i.e. the real one would be slower and even more dull.

Now I'm very curious how the Austrians will ballance the rules to have a fair competition with normal Rally2...

Nope, 2x 125 kW is what I read.

[Mirek]

Nope, 2x 125 kW is what I read.

Sorry, You are right.

[Rally Power]

Rally, to survive, has to follow alternative fuels as power sources, much like F1 is doing starting from 2025.

Fingers crossed, but ICEs future can be at risk with the new Euro 7 emissions standards, which will be voted at the end of the year by EU’s parliament. Some say they will be so severe that manus won’t be able to keep ICEs. That wouldn’t affect F1 bubble, but it’d probably have a huge impact on Rally, as the sport is deeply linked to manus production.

Btw, only a few bosses in the industry are brave enough to publicly criticise EVs extreme political push; hats off to Mr. Toyoda for being one of them: https://www.wsj.com/articles/toyotas...ed-11608196665

[Francis44]

Fingers crossed, but ICEs future can be at risk with the new Euro 7 emissions standards, which will be voted at the end of the year by EU’s parliament. Some say they will be so severe that manus won’t be able to keep ICEs. That wouldn’t affect F1 bubble, but it’d probably have a huge impact on Rally, as the sport is deeply linked to manus production.

Btw, only a few bosses in the industry are brave enough to publicly criticise EVs extreme political push; hats off to Mr. Toyoda for being one of them: https://www.wsj.com/articles/toyotas...ed-11608196665

Indeed, I believe that this exact pressure will push manus to develop other technologies. Electric is here to stay obviously, but I strongly feel we will see other surprising options in the next 10 years.

F1 is keeping very quiet (well as quiet as they can) about this, but everyone in the paddock feels very strongly that full EV formula cars are not viable nor interesting to the championship.

Time will tell.

[djip]

Fingers crossed, but ICEs future can be at risk with the new Euro 7 emissions standards, which will be voted at the end of the year by EU’s parliament. Some say they will be so severe that manus won’t be able to keep ICEs. That wouldn’t affect F1 bubble, but it’d probably have a huge impact on Rally, as the sport is deeply linked to manus production.

Btw, only a few bosses in the industry are brave enough to publicly criticise EVs extreme political push; hats off to Mr. Toyoda for being one of them: https://www.wsj.com/articles/toyotas...ed-11608196665

You are correct - Rallying has missed a golden opportunity to become relevant again. Their switch to Hybrid has been very late, they had an opportunity to make it way more "extreme" and missed it. Think about full EV on liaisons / ICE on stages (including recharging for the next liaison etc ...), maybe even full EV with fast charging at stages end. I understand the engineering challenge (added battery weight, battery life, ...), I understand it may not look anymore like the rallying that we know (which is already a far cry from the one that i grew up with in the 70's) - but if you believe the market value of rallying is to relate to manus production using the same roads as average Joe, can you imagine the PR dream by saying "you commute on these roads everyday, winter and summer - now our champions are doing the same at full speed with our EV - no problem". Wouldn't that be a true proof point for EV acceptance ? Attracting manus to the sport, instead of leaving one by one ?
Yes it will be dull for a few years (even though save from the noise, the lastest Skoda rally EV video looked OK), but how did you felt in 1987 when the GpA cars followed the uber-exciting Gp.B machines ?
Yes rallyes may have to become shorter / more compact, but isn't that already happening ?
I am not saying i would be happy for such move to happen, but i see that this may be (have been ?) the only way for Rallying to become one of the golden series as it once was.

[Rally Power]

You are correct - Rallying has missed a golden opportunity to become relevant again. Their switch to Hybrid has been very late, they had an opportunity to make it way more "extreme" and missed it. Think about full EV on liaisons / ICE on stages (including recharging for the next liaison etc ...), maybe even full EV with fast charging at stages end. I understand the engineering challenge (added battery weight, battery life, ...), I understand it may not look anymore like the rallying that we know (which is already a far cry from the one that i grew up with in the 70's) - but if you believe the market value of rallying is to relate to manus production using the same roads as average Joe, can you imagine the PR dream by saying "you commute on these roads everyday, winter and summer - now our champions are doing the same at full speed with our EV - no problem". Wouldn't that be a true proof point for EV acceptance ? Attracting manus to the sport, instead of leaving one by one ?
Yes it will be dull for a few years (even though save from the noise, the lastest Skoda rally EV video looked OK), but how did you felt in 1987 when the GpA cars followed the uber-exciting Gp.B machines ?
Yes rallyes may have to become shorter / more compact, but isn't that already happening ?
I am not saying i would be happy for such move to happen, but i see that this may be (have been ?) the only way for Rallying to become one of the golden series as it once was.

Actually I believe Hybrids are the right choice for the WRC, once battery powered EVs (BEVs) aren’t ready for a proper Rally use (unless the WRC is suddenly transformed into a Mickey Mouse competition, like FE). Besides, even if their share continues to grow, EVs are still a small fraction (around 3%) of the global car market.

The point is that the industry may not have time to look for alternatives (like synthetic fuels), once EU politicians seem eager to impose BEVs as the sole option. Reports on the future Euro 7 norms are scary, making one to believe that ICEs may start to be dropped in 2025. If so, we can only hope that the Hybrid WRC era will allow the necessary time (fingers crossed for being a long one) to make future electric Rally cars interesting to follow.

https://www.electrive.com/2020/11/16...ions-standard/
http://www.journalauto.com/lja/artic.../constructeurs

[Francis44]

You are correct - Rallying has missed a golden opportunity to become relevant again. Their switch to Hybrid has been very late, they had an opportunity to make it way more "extreme" and missed it. Think about full EV on liaisons / ICE on stages (including recharging for the next liaison etc ...), maybe even full EV with fast charging at stages end. I understand the engineering challenge (added battery weight, battery life, ...), I understand it may not look anymore like the rallying that we know (which is already a far cry from the one that i grew up with in the 70's) - but if you believe the market value of rallying is to relate to manus production using the same roads as average Joe, can you imagine the PR dream by saying "you commute on these roads everyday, winter and summer - now our champions are doing the same at full speed with our EV - no problem". Wouldn't that be a true proof point for EV acceptance ? Attracting manus to the sport, instead of leaving one by one ?
Yes it will be dull for a few years (even though save from the noise, the lastest Skoda rally EV video looked OK), but how did you felt in 1987 when the GpA cars followed the uber-exciting Gp.B machines ?
Yes rallyes may have to become shorter / more compact, but isn't that already happening ?
I am not saying i would be happy for such move to happen, but i see that this may be (have been ?) the only way for Rallying to become one of the golden series as it once was.

That is all fine and dandy, but how can you maintain a championship if most of the current follower base leaves and you have trouble appealing to a new one (interested in full EVs)?

That is no go for me.

Rally Power: Both articles are from clear pro EV websites, they always tend to muddy the waters in their favor.

We must not forget EU for example is making it all about CO2, so if you are able to develop a CO2 neutral fuel, for example, you cannot just ban it for not being a BEV. They have set their legal base so there is room for other options.