[WRC] Safari Rally Kenya 2021

[scn]

Acropolis couldn’t even make it to the minimum of 300 km this year…

You can't make the rallies longer by just increasing the limit, the whole structure must support the longer format. More tyres, more service visits, more driving days, more days of recce...equals more expenses. Who pays for that? Who wants that other than a small group of old farts who crave for nostalgy? The average spectator who watches the two live stages on TV or goes to spectate one stage on his domestic rally? The drivers for example have said rallies could be already shorter than they are now.

a) The average Greek spectator laughs at this year's Acropolis. No Greek spectator considers this year's rally worthy of the name Acropolis. (This year's Acropolis is soft, despite being silly short). It is not "small group of old farts", it is almost everyone.
b) It is not nostalgy. It is purely an opinion that not all rallies should be just sprints and some of them should have the endurance element.
c) There can be a three days Acropolis, with exactly the same format as this year's, but with more than 500 km of SS. No extra service parks, just extra tyre changes. The increase in cost for the organizer will be a very small percentage of the total cost. There is no need for extra days for recce and the increase in recce fuel will be less than 150 euros per crew, there is no increase in cost for hotels and the only actual increase will be on the cost of tyres. OK, it is 12 tyres more per 4WD car. A cost of about 4000 euros. I don't think that any of these teams is not able to afford it for one or two rallies per year.

[dimviii]

are they a bit higher on suspension,or is just my impression?
https://twitter.com/RallySportMag/st...98714905964544

[mknight]

I would guess the cost of running a WRC car per stage km is quite high, especially for a rough rally.

[dimviii]

Colla Verglas
@CollaVerglas
Un amic em passa els kilometratges d'anteriors edicions del @wrcsafarirally
:

1983 = 5,035 kms
1985 = 5167,00 kms
1989 = 4538,00 kms
1992 = 4387,84 kms
1994 = 2393,00 kms
1995 = 2955,00 kms
1996 = 1493,20 kms
1997 = 1318,00 kms
1998 = 1063,49 lms
1999 = 1009,91 kms
2000 = 1047,26 kms
2001 = 1079,81 kms
2002 = 936,05 kms
2021 = 320,19 kms

[Tauri_J]

Points for every stage defies the nature of rallying.
Imagine the 24 hours of Le Mans assigning points after every hour, or circuit racing assigning points every single lap to the leader. There would be no "endurance" element, only sprint sprint sprint. And the winner of the event might end up 3rd in points for the weekend, which in my opinion should never happen, one power stage is enough for rallying.

Dont try to compare Le Mans 24h to WRC...theres no comparison. WRC is now a sprint no question about it. Theres rarely any endurance element left. Obviously points system need a complete overhaul.

100 for winner 70 for 2nd etc
20 stages and 20 extra points
PS 10 points

[AnttiL]

c) There can be a three days Acropolis, with exactly the same format as this year's, but with more than 500 km of SS. No extra service parks, just extra tyre changes. The increase in cost for the organizer will be a very small percentage of the total cost. There is no need for extra days for recce and the increase in recce fuel will be less than 150 euros per crew, there is no increase in cost for hotels and the only actual increase will be on the cost of tyres. OK, it is 12 tyres more per 4WD car. A cost of about 4000 euros. I don't think that any of these teams is not able to afford it for one or two rallies per year.

If it's so simple and cheap, why did this year's Acropolis become so short?

I would claim extra recce days would be needed almost certainly for a 500 km route. Of course it depends on how dense the route is. As for extra costs, every stage you arrange requires personnel, marshalls, medical personnel, that is not free. And of course the road repairs.

[focus206]

Dont try to compare Le Mans 24h to WRC...theres no comparison. WRC is now a sprint no question about it. Theres rarely any endurance element left. Obviously points system need a complete overhaul.

100 for winner 70 for 2nd etc
20 stages and 20 extra points
PS 10 points

WRC is not a total sprint. Events' Km might be less, but in more rounds than not you see drivers lifting their foot and controlling to reach the end safely. Less than in the past, but I see no reason to add points for every stage to de-naturalize rallying even more.
If you give many points per stage win, it leads to the absurdity of driver A ending up behind driver B in the classification, but collecting more points. If you give only few points (like 100 points for rally win and 1 point for stage win), then almost nothing changes from how things are now. No one would push to the limit and risk to crash out for 1 point more, unless you're a championship competitor in the last round I guess. Maybe super-rally competitors would push more since they have nothing else to lose.

[AnttiL]

WRC is not a total sprint. Events' Km might be less, but in more rounds than not you see drivers lifting their foot and controlling to reach the end safely. Less than in the past, but I see no reason to add points for every stage to de-naturalize rallying even more.
If you give many points per stage win, it leads to the absurdity of driver A ending up behind driver B in the classification, but collecting more points. If you give only few points (like 100 points for rally win and 1 point for stage win), then almost nothing changes from how things are now. No one would push to the limit and risk to crash out for 1 point more, unless you're a championship competitor in the last round I guess. Maybe super-rally competitors would push more since they have nothing else to lose.

Also, it would be tempting to still cruise and save your tyres on the three first Sunday stages if it helps you get 10 points from the power stage.

[Fast Eddie WRC]

Thierry Neuville @thierryneuville

We wanted the adventure and now we have it ! The stages of @wrcsafarirally are beautiful but also very rough in some places. Here, the word « challenging » finds its meaning ! It will be a tough event but we will do the best we can to get a good result on this 6th #WRC round.

[dimviii]

AfricaFlag of KenyaFlag of United KingdomFlag of South Africa
@kukuandchips

Just seen some pictures of soy sambu after a recce, very badly rutted already