2023 WRC News & Rumours

[EstWRC]

Well now that Toyota and Hyundai are set there is no rush to announce anything. MSport will take their time as usual and they don't even need to decide the full year in advance. When is the Monte entry deadline?

16.12 is deadline

When Ogier joined them for 2017, then the announcement came on 12th of December

[Eli]

For the championship I’m really glad we didn’t see Ott jump ship to Toyota, however if he doesn’t go back to Cumbria it will be a huge loss for all involved, understandable but he will be missed in the service park.

[denkimi]

Kinda have to agree with that. Evans is struggling with Rally1 and Neuville never had the speed on fast gravel + makes too many unnecessary mistakes.

i still wonder how anyone can look at the standings, see a 12 point gap between 2 drivers in the same car at the end of the season, a gap that could have easily been reversed, and think: this one driver can take on rovanpera, but this other one surely can't.

[Rallyest]

i still wonder how anyone can look at the standings, see a 12 point gap between 2 drivers in the same car at the end of the season, a gap that could have easily been reversed, and think: this one driver can take on rovanpera, but this other one surely can't.

If you look into the detail of that point gap only being 12 points you understand the difference of level of theese drivers, not saying Neuville is not fast, but only driver error that cost Tänak points this year was Monte

[mknight]

i still wonder how anyone can look at the standings, see a 12 point gap between 2 drivers in the same car at the end of the season, a gap that could have easily been reversed, and think: this one driver can take on rovanpera, but this other one surely can't.

None of the two drivers were a threat to Rovanpera this year.

But I don't base my opinion on this year, but on how Neuville managed to lose 2017 and 2018 championships with own mistakes (and 2019 with poor mid-season) He just doesn't seem to have that last bit of reliability in.

[meh]

My takeaways so far.

So far, the sad one - If previously Toyota was always with 4 cars and Hyundai sometimes with 4 cars, then we kind of lost 2 cars - now both are with 3 cars.

The next potentially sad one is if Tänak retires or even stays out of full season competitor.

But, logic says, that M-Sport should not let go Breen if they don't have better plan (and I'm personally doubt that Breen volunteered to switch full-season to unknown half-season in another team).

Another logic says, if Tänak wanted to retire, he could do it and announced it already. What could be the logic to wait?

[meh]

None of the two drivers were a threat to Rovanpera this year.

Let's take a look to Sweden Hybrid failure for Tänak - take this one away and picture is really different.

But I don't base my opinion on this year, but on how Neuville managed to lose 2017 and 2018 championships with own mistakes (and 2019 with poor mid-season) He just doesn't seem to have that last bit of reliability in.

And it makes sense to never underestimate anyone, including Neuville, because he was not on the top step on the podium and the end of season. Or Evans, because he didn't find the match with car setup this year.

[EstWRC]

i still wonder how anyone can look at the standings, see a 12 point gap between 2 drivers in the same car at the end of the season, a gap that could have easily been reversed, and think: this one driver can take on rovanpera, but this other one surely can't.

Thierry had 23 point lead over Ott after Portugal and managed to loose with 12 points in the end

Interesting Calculations from est forum

If first 4 rallies not included this season:
Tänak 168
Rovanperä 149
Neuville 133

If first two rallies taken out :
Rovanperä 209
Tänak 200
Neuville 161


First half of the season Tänak earned 62 points and Thierry 80 points. That includes Tänaks 3 retirements in Monte because of him and in Sweden and safari because of the car while Thierry retired once in sardegna

Second half of the season since Estonia Tänak got 143 points and Thierry 113 points. Tänak didn’t retire at all and Thierry did in Ypres because of his mistake.

Fact is that Thierry got beaten 2-1 in overall standings by Ott during those 3 years together and we have seen the previous years how Thierry just can’t put it together.

[seb_sh]

My takeaways so far.

So far, the sad one - If previously Toyota was always with 4 cars and Hyundai sometimes with 4 cars, then we kind of lost 2 cars - now both are with 3 cars.

Sadly indeed, at the moment it looks like we will have fewer cars than last year, but depends how many customers MSport gets.

If we are doing a bit of analysis of the teams I would say Toyota looks good they lose Lappi but Ogier is doing more rounds than last year and Evans looked finally better in Japan. On the other hand Hyundai ticked some interesting boxes:
- knowledge of both Yaris and Puma
- two drivers good on tarmac and slow gravel
- two drivers good on fast gravel
- only Neuville is clear title favourite

Of course losing Tanak is a big blow but the lineup has some logic. For the manufacturers title it's similar to how they won in 2019, for the drivers title they are going all in on Neuville but if he gets a good year he can be in the fight.

[pettersolberg29]

There's a fourth Toyota going free for the events Ogier isn't competing in... nothing announced for it yet, but I don't see that seat remaining empty...

Remember Latvala said his phone has been ringing a lot and I would be surprised if someone like Mikkelsen, Loubet, maybe even Solberg, Lindholm or a gentleman driver is in that 4th car at times.