Rally2 (ex-R5) News

[Andre Oliveira]

Team FJ too

image.jpg

[itix]

Any Swedes that know if there is some movement on the Mitsubishi Mirage project?

Yeah it is national regs only for the moment. It is built to specs but not homologated.

It's second ever rally, first stage went past my parents house so I had a front row seat. It came second overall and was only beaten by an ex works prodrive Subaru.

Dunno how well it would fare in competition with other R5s though. It beat a couple of WRC Fords and Octavias so it can't be too slow.

I have some pictures and some video that I can share when I am not on a satellite connection!

I am not sure what keeps it from homologation though. Three customers in sweden have taken delivery so it must be ready for sale...

[dodge33cymru]

I thought Mitsubishi told them they couldn't homologate it? It would need their permission and they weren't willing to put their stamp on it.

If that is true, it could be the same as the Abu Dhabi deal that they killed a few years ago that recently came (back) to light.

[skarderud]

The Mitsubishi mirage will run in South swedish rally in september. That rally is a part of the norwegian-swedish "nation-battle" together with Norways rally Hedmarken.
Eyvind Brynhildsen, Anders grøndal, Fredrik åhlin and others is doing this rally, so there we have a good match for it.

[Rally Power]

I thought Mitsubishi told them they couldn't homologate it? It would need their permission and they weren't willing to put their stamp on it.

If Mpart AB is going only for national homologation perhaps they just need the help from Mitsubishi Sweden, that seems to be a partner from day one. But it hould be a shame that this little funny car doesn't get a full international FIA homologation.

[Sulland]

The Mitsubishi mirage will run in South swedish rally in september. That rally is a part of the norwegian-swedish "nation-battle" together with Norways rally Hedmarken.
Eyvind Brynhildsen, Anders grøndal, Fredrik åhlin and others is doing this rally, so there we have a good match for it.

Så Skarderud, din Veslehamring 😎, if they will get homologation in Sweden, then it could easier get the same in Norway, could it not. Or would that be believing in Santa Claus??

[skarderud]

I know that atleast 3 drivers in Norway want to by this Mitsubishi, so hopefully the norwegian federation will do something unexpekted@

[itix]

What could Mitsubishi possibly gain from not homologating it? It is literally free marketing. Sure if it is uncompetitive they might come in bad light but I still feel like taking part is better than not taking part at all.

After all, their group N evos usually compete in the same classes as the R5s in national competition so they are not exactly in good light already.

If I remember correctly there was a Fiesta R5 in Skilling 500 also. The full start list is not on ewrc so I'd need to check my rally program. In any case it finished second behind a very experienced guy in a Prodrive Subaru (Co driven by my sisters old classmate... Funny how small the world is sometimes) so it can't be that slow.

Is it maybe the same case as the Hyundai team, that there isn't enough production units of it? Or something like that?

Sent from my SM-G900F using Tapatalk

[Mirek]

What could Mitsubishi possibly gain from not homologating it? It is literally free marketing. Sure if it is uncompetitive they might come in bad light but I still feel like taking part is better than not taking part at all.

I don't agree or do You think that the epic fails of MSD with MG or Opel helped the brands somehow? In my opposite it was exactly opposite. MEM with proton managed to get their car on quite competitive level and despite them being cheaper then the competitors they still sold nearly no cars at all as the more expensive competitors had faster and more reliable machines. R5 is very very difficult class to build a competitive machine and You can see that even Peugeot Sport/Citroën Racing failed miserably. You can only dream about some private car being competitive there.

Don't get me wrong. I have absolutely nothing against private teams developing cars but I do understand why manufacturers are very careful to support them. It's a big game and if You want to play it You need to put a lot in. That's why Škoda is where it is (if we speak about R5).

[itix]

I don't agree or do You think that the epic fails of MSD with MG or Opel helped the brands somehow? In my opposite it was exactly opposite. MEM with proton managed to get their car on quite competitive level and despite them being cheaper then the competitors they still sold nearly no cars at all as the more expensive competitors had faster and more reliable machines. R5 is very very difficult class to build a competitive machine and You can see that even Peugeot Sport/Citroën Racing failed miserably. You can only dream about some private car being competitive there.

Don't get me wrong. I have absolutely nothing against private teams developing cars but I do understand why manufacturers are very careful to support them. It's a big game and if You want to play it You need to put a lot in. That's why Škoda is where it is (if we speak about R5).

MSD and MG is a project I don't know anything about. Weren't they involved in the Hyundai Accident WRC? (intentional )

Somehow I still believe that it gets the name across... If proton was available for Purchase in sweden and they had still been competing (and did an actual hot hatch) I could consider buying it even though it would not be mega competitive.

I did actually consider buying a 208 GTI because LOOK AT THAT 208 R5, daaaaaaamn! (*drool*) Economy and sense made sure I bought another, newer 206 GTI instead. Citroën DS3 was also considered but their engines are too weak (and the DS3 racing look silly and was a limited run).

If I had taken anything from the ERC and the WRC 2 with me in those considerations, I would have come to the conclusion that 208s run 5 km and then break down, badly. I didn't however because many more factors than pure performance played in.

As a kid I had not heard about neither Skoda not Hyundai but thanks to their WRC participation I subsequently knew about them. I didn't care much for the Accident but I did drool a bit over the Skoda vRS models (after counting my weekly allowance and realising that I'd die before I'd buy a 206 GTI with that aloowance).

Now I am adult and my allowance is bigger so I bought two 206 GTI instead (because ultimately it was better looking and Grönholm is cooler than Roman Kresta!).

I think participating does matter. If I was a kid this summer and saw a Mirage blast past my parents front lawn, I'd be interested! I'd read that rally program that we got in the mailbox a million times over and the car would stick in my memory (because it isn't horribly hideous).

Also Skoda is where they are because the VW wrc team has shared their knowledge with Skoda, I'm sure!