WRC future

[NickRally]

TBH I thought the idea behind this "green" thing was not to simply head into "selling electric suvs" but to make "transportation" a completely different thing. Like fully Shared and possibly Autonomous mobilty. Like electric-autonomous "buses" and shared ride - like 2 or 4 or 6 or 8 seat "vans" that are owned by the "manufactures", running away from the idea of "individual's cars". (So we could have WAY less cars on road and the ones that are out there would be always being used by people, so you can erase the concept of "parking" from out daily lives) And with more room for bikes and e-motos, e-scooters and things like that.
Just selling a billion electric suvs will not change a thing in this planet so I agree with the idea of "Its just a lie" when "they" say we need to have only electric cars in the streets.
Humans will never restore the environment by PRODUCING more and more things. This is what took us to "this". Humans cannot save the environment because we are the ones ruinning it.

Couldn't agree more.

[AndyRAC]

We need far less cars on the road; replacing petrol/diesel with EVs isn't a solution. Driving 5 mins down the road for a paper/loaf of bread/taking the kids to school is absolutely insane.......that is what we need to change. And I say this as a petrolhead/motorsport fan......

[lmmjvss]

Oh... and lets not forget that we actually need electric planes and cargo-ships. Cars are one of the fractions of this whole problem.

- But dont worry, motorsport will save the world again! Alejandro Agag is releasing the "e1 series" for electric boats and that old "red bull air race" (actually an interesting championship tbh) is now owned by FAI and the FAI World Air Race Championship will debut in 2022 with plans to have those "eVtol"(electric?...plane/drones?... with Vertical landings and take off...???) by 2024.

[fiscorpun]

Cool to see that at least most of the hardcore motorsport fans KNOW that all that "green agenda" is B.S.
Im all in favor of the ideas of producing WAY less cars and making them autonomous and shared and mostly electric for the streets. Tho I thought electric Motosrport would be the place for the "battery revolution" but we are not even close to that, since formula-e, extreme-e, fia eGT, eTCR, eRallycross etc are ALL spec. No room for inovations and new tech. IMO this is just a terrible failure at the core of what motorsport should be. Solar panels will probably enter some crazy revolution in a few years (5?) and that will change electric mobilty a lot too. Again... it could be motorsport pushing that tech too. It is not
"Sad face Hashtag"

[Sulland]

Lets do a what if.

What if Hyundai decide this is too expensive, lets pull out of Rally or pull out of just Rally1, and continue the Rally2 program.

What will that do to the 2022 season, and the future of the WRC?

[er88]

Hyundai won't pull out due to expense. I'm sure they're remaining in WRC, but if they do call it quits it will be because they start the season horribly/don't feel they can get competitive.

But to answer your question - nothing major would happen to the 22 season. We had 2 manufacturers for years with Citroen and Ford. Tanak and Neuville will probably join Msport to partner Breen in a lead team, Greensmith, Fourmaux will become a pay team for younger drivers + Loeb on a few events. Solberg would probably join Katsuta in the Toyota development team.

[WRCStan]

Lets do a what if.

What if Hyundai decide this is too expensive, lets pull out of Rally or pull out of just Rally1, and continue the Rally2 program.

What will that do to the 2022 season, and the future of the WRC?

I believe they are contractually obliged to do three seasons of what they helped to install. Being too expensive is not a valid excuse and not having Rally1 customers because it's too expensive is also not a valid excuse. They agreed to Rally1 being solely a manufacturer's (PR) game and is probably why they are still there at all. The future at the top of WRC hangs on this fundamental.

If they leave it may open the door for another to join long term. I don't believe Hyundai would have joined at all if WRC wasn't in a poor state back then with what - 2.5 manufacturers? VW left officially because of the negative PR, Citroen left officially because they couldn't win - neither because it was too expensive. I'll go to the extreme and say the threat of another manufacturer joining probably has more influence on Hyundai leaving then the costs. So IMO Hyundai leaving doesn't change anything about the sport's future alone.

As for 2022. Rally1 would obviously be duller with fewer fights. I can't see a situation where they'd continue Rally2 without Rally1.

[mknight]

For these big manus the WRC expenses are basically a rounding error on their yearly results.

It's all about the will and image.

VW had to show they are saving money ( to their shareholders) after facing all the dieselgate compensations.

Citroen had bad car and correspondingly bad publicity. (Shitroen..)

Subaru in 2008 had both of the above.

Lately manus don't want to be "seen" promoting petrol-only motorsport on top of these usual subjects.

[WRCStan]

When do you think we'll see the first fuel-economy stages? 5-4-3-2-1 points for the most fuel-efficient stage, or is it all the time now with the hybrids.

[mknight]

We will get a switch to full electric before any "fuel saving" points.