The new FIA WRC-car concept 2017

[Lundefaret]

To make rallying great, we need to dream. Great stuff is founded on dreams.

Today it does not matter if the WRC goes to China or Argentina, Finland or Greece, there will be more similarities than differences, and the sense of adventure has gone.

The Rally Monte Carlo is maybe the best example. It is ruined, but it could be made great again (it was on its way during the IRC days).
Not that many years ago it started from starting points across Europe. Even in Oslo, Norway. They all gathered in France, and ran the rally in the alps around Monaco. It was night stages, more days, the drivers needed to endure a harder work out, again making them seem like bigger heroes.

Today such a layout for Monaco would be 100% doable (it is still done in the Historic, which I have had the pleassure to attend as a codriver).
It would be great for bringing rally to the people, and would fit hand in glove with social media.
Every check point in Europe would be host of larger or smaller events, and the Return On Investment in regards to marketing would be great. You would have a lot of press in national, regional and local media, which have several benefits. 1) Media exposure. 2) Creating a demand in the public of wanting to know more about the event, including results, etc. Increasing the value of the event, and the sport all the way.

Each rally should be looked at in the same way. How can we make the best possible event/show out of this?
And each rally should have its own character. A totally similar German and French event is a no go. And all rallies dont need to be 1000KM, but some should.

To make this feasible, one needs to take the total responsibility of the event away from the local organizer, and set up a WRC orginazing team that works with the locals in a whole other fashion then now.

Take Rally China as an example.
This could be a great rally for China and the WRC. This could and should be The Great Oriental Adventure.
To make this happen one can not rely on local organization achieving above their experience and competence in a test event. One have to have a large team from the promotor that does the organizing, this have to be experienced rally organizers that are of the same calibre as the ones that made the 1970 London to Mexico happen, and also a "concept staff" making the event the best adventure it could be.
If that is in place, then one off course need a very good dialogue with the locals, so that everything is in order with the local communities etc.
Then one could start to brain storm. What about a jump over the Great Wall Of China, what about etc etc.

Today arranging a WRC rally is made very difficult because one are so reliant on local forces both in organizing and financing. This makes it unnecessarily difficult to "think big".


Then a few points to Mirek: I am a great admirer of both Loeb and Ogier, and know their history quit well. Talking about the expense of WRC-cars, I was referring to the times when everthing was active etc. (But i still would like to see more cost cuts to modern rallycars, or more bang for the buck)

[danon]

To make rallying great, we need to dream. Great stuff is founded on dreams.

Imagination is the beginning of creation.
You imagine what you desire, you will what you imagine and at last you create what you will.

World Rally Car 2025

[Rally Power]

Today it does not matter if the WRC goes to China or Argentina, Finland or Greece, there will be more similarities than differences, and the sense of adventure has gone.

This is a recurrent debate in the forum and many of us were expecting that Mr. Todt should be able to resurrect WRC adventurous side. But it seems he has failled...so now we're stuck on this sport identity crisis, the perfect environment for Red Bull show off promoters ruin it once for all.

Of course the "each one for itself" spirit of the FIA members (and event organizers) doesn't help in order to find a proper solution, that is in front of us since the early days of rally: transnational events!

We could easily reshape the marathon spirit of the old classics (the Monte, the Alpine Coupe, the Liege-Sofia-Liege, etc) developing close to the border rallys, like it has been timidly attempted in the Swedish rally with the use of Norwegian stages.

Instead of 13 or 14 almost sprint look-alike courses, it would be feasible to organize 8 to 10 full week long (up to 600 ss kms with a day halt) rallys, pairing transnational similar events. A Monte using French and Italian roads, a Scandinavian rally in Sweden and Norway snowy forests, a Baltic rally between Finland and Estonia (or Russia), a proper UK rally, from Wales to Scotland, a Iberia Rally, with north Portuguese and Galiza gravel and tarmac stages, etc, etc., and larger overseas events in Australia, Argentina (with an excursion to Brasil), China and one well promoted North American rally (USA/Canada) replacing Mexico and profiting from the local RX exposure, would certanly revitalize WRC, providing a bright future to the sport!

[Rally Power]

Looks great Danon, but I think Fiat is already testing a car for 2017: https://youtu.be/EfdSOhU-i1Y?t=47

[danon]

Looks great Danon, but I think Fiat is already testing a car for 2017: https://youtu.be/EfdSOhU-i1Y?t=47

Cool... is it Gigi Galli behind the wheel

[Lundefaret]

We could easily reshape the marathon spirit of the old classics (the Monte, the Alpine Coupe, the Liege-Sofia-Liege, etc) developing close to the border rallys, like it has been timidly attempted in the Swedish rally with the use of Norwegian stages.

Instead of 13 or 14 almost sprint look-alike courses, it would be feasible to organize 8 to 10 full week long (up to 600 ss kms with a day halt) rallys, pairing transnational similar events. A Monte using French and Italian roads, a Scandinavian rally in Sweden and Norway snowy forests, a Baltic rally between Finland and Estonia (or Russia), a proper UK rally, from Wales to Scotland, a Iberia Rally, with north Portuguese and Galiza gravel and tarmac stages, etc, etc., and larger overseas events in Australia, Argentina (with an excursion to Brasil), China and one well promoted North American rally (USA/Canada) replacing Mexico and profiting from the local RX exposure, would certanly revitalize WRC, providing a bright future to the sport!

Totally agree, and this is what I am talking about!

The best bit: Its better economics for everyone involved:
- Lower logistics cost
- More media prescense at each venue.
- The extended time would allow more people to interact, both in national, regional and local media, and on social media, and out on the event.
- More localities can "split" the bill and shear the income. The longer time The Show is set in one region, the more money it creates locally and regionally.
(Covering larger geographical areas have huge impact, and rallying is the only motorsport that can do this, so this should be set as a Core Value, and be exploited to the fullest)

If this should work the promotor needs to rethink the way to do bussiness, and the works teams should rethink how they use their money.

The promotor needs to:
- Understand "the Spirit Of Rallying."
- Have a large organizational team (also recruiting some locals if needed/possible). This can bring the rally to new places and countries.
- Make large investments in media equipment, making live stages (as Eurosport did in the Monte IRC, but more) the norm.
- Make a better Web-based fan centre.
- Take advantage of the great possibilities from gaming.

The FIA needs to:
- Understand "the Spirit Of Rallying."
- Make new regulations taking in account: safety, looks, sound, cost, and cost of the organizer.
- Make a budgetary cost cap.
- Make the feeders series so cheap that real talents can get up the ladder.
- Work with national motorsport associations doing a copy of Autos de Jounes in A LOT of countries do discover talents.

The Works teams needs to:
- Understand "the Spirit Of Rallying."
- Spend money also in the feeders series, like the ERC.
- Spend money in national series. Its the "masses" that makes the pointed end sharper. A very easy way to do this is arranging local rally cups. A works team in rallying should be acquired to develop a Cup car with a maximal cost of about 15.000-20.000 Eur (Opel Adam Cup is a perfect example), and commit to spending X amount of Eur on a series (prize money etc).

[Sulland]

As I see this there are two different wishes for the future of the rally sport that meets.

One camp see that the manufacurer and promotor influence, that has gotten it as they want it with FIA in the latter years.
This goes both on cars and on format of rallies.

The others would like more freedom. Both on cars and difference of the rallies.

Rally has traditionally been the maverick of motorsport. Happening in the coutryside, either in a dark forrest on gravel or snow, or a narrow asphalt road. Cars have been made in garages, or by small teams.
FIA was all about racing, mostly F1. Bernie turned that into a money machine.

Then someone saw possibilities of doing the same thing with rally, but lost some of the magic in the process. It has become too industrial and streamlined.

How can we shape the future so both camps will be satisfied?

[Jack4688`]

I think what you are all looking for (and I would agree here) is a separate 'World Endurance Rally Championship'. I don't think the WRC is going to offer what some of us hardcore fans want anytime soon and it would be foolish to think that FIA/World Rally Commission/WRC Promoter are going to make the wholesale changes needed for that to happen in the near future.

Likewise a spin-off of the WRC isn't going to happen, nor a full blown R-GT World Championship with works Porsche 911s, Ferrari 488 GTBs, Lotus Exige-Ss, etc etc etc

[Rally Power]

I don't think the WRC is going to offer what some of us hardcore fans want anytime soon and it would be foolish to think that FIA/World Rally Commission/WRC Promoter are going to make the wholesale changes needed for that to happen in the near future.

Unfortunately you're probably right, and in the case of transnational rally's the great obstacle would be the compatibility of the ASN's representatives egos.

But there are viable changes and one of them is to rid of the 9 to 5 ridiculous schedule. WRC rallys have to be more intense and psychical demanding. Drivers must be admired not only for their pure speed ability but also for their strength and endurance capacities.

Sunday morning short leg should be discarded but the 350/400 ss total kms could be maintain. This would mean having Friday and Saturday legs with close to 200 ss kms each and extended schedules (up to 16 hours), using night sections and flexi service areas. It could also be considered to spread the use of different surface legs, like in Catalunyia.

This are realistic and inexpensive ways to revive the traditional rally spirit and generate more media interest and spectating enthusiasm over WRC, for sure more effective and less radical than the shoot out (and God knows what else...) plans from RB promoter team.

[Mirek]

I personally find strange why it's not allowed in WRC to run trully mixed events like Cyprus in IRC/MERC/ERC looked. I found that awesome and way better than the original slow and rough Cyprus everybody remembers from WRC. If it works with low-budget teams from regional championships why shall it be a problem for rich works WRC teams?