74th PZM Rally Poland

[Fast Eddie WRC]

45 mins wont do justice to a WRC rally anyway. Back in the day even a national rally got an hour !

Just another sign of the WRC being dumbed-down... sprint rallies get sprint tv coverage.

[mknight]

To be honest all the WR drivers are extremely talented and should get decent air time. Leferve should have also received some air time considering he was the fastest Citroen and his car did not inlude any jokers... that's an interesting story by itself.

True there were a lot of drivers that could at least get one-sentence mention. Lefevbre certainly could get mentioned for best result of the year and one of best Citroen results one rally after being dropped by the team. (should be interesting angle for brit. jurnos)

But the story about jokers is not especially interesting. The changes they did were supposed to make the car easier to control, not faster (i.e. not like they changed the engine or something). So you had Breen and Lefevbre driving a car they have been driving for half a year and testing for longer and Mikkelsen driving a "new" car where they didn't had chance to do any wet test/setup at all.
Btw. on Sardinia Ogier's car was suppoed to have some dif. upgrade which Tanak couldn't get... and Tanak won.

Wonder how many chances Hanninen has before he's on the cutting block. Does anyone think he can recover this late in that season? Will a few podiums secure his seat for next year?

No, too late, only thing that would save him now is 3x solid finishes (5th and up) in a row, that's something I see as virtually impossible. Lappi has been clearly faster than him in Sardinia and about same speed in Portugal, now in Poland even Suninen was faster. Not the mention 2 Citroens. Yes he had some technical issues but it's not like he was fast inbetween, for whole saturday and sunday best were 2 9th places.

It was quite a risk from Tommi in the first place, but Hanninen was available and had some wrc experience to complement Lappi and Sunninen (at that point). He will certainly let him drive rest of the rallies this year, but I do think somebody else will be signing a contract for that spot. Given what Latvala has shown with the car I totally can see better drivers than Hanninen being interested (Tanak, Mikkelsen, maybe even Ogier, + Suninen will likely be available).

[dimviii]

The changes they did were supposed to make the car easier to control, not faster (i.e. not like they changed the engine or something)

easier to control=faster.

[Zeakiwi]

Kiwis are hardcore. Just look at the NZ rally series. They have a ton of small manufacturers sponsoring AP4 spec rally machines which are similar to R5 but a bit more open. Mazda, Toyota, Mini, Holden and a few others running that series. Entries are usually close to triple digits. Another reason why we will most likely move out of Sydney for New Zealand. They love Motorsport and they have gravel roads for days which are always open to the public for testing. Rally paradise playground! Kiwis are also the nices most respectful people I've come across in all my travels.

A few points. The current Australian wrc round is held at Coffs Harbour which is 600? kilometres north of Sydney.
NZ has lost some of the classic gravel road stages used in past wrc years, the roads have been tar sealed.
I suspect the 2 day 'candidate' event planned for NZ this year is likely to have a moderate amount of touring distance between the special stages. A three day event would likely have a lengthy touring section (by comparison to most current wrc events) at some point in order to get the quality stages and stage distance and possibly require a remote refuel, service, tyre change. The candidate event is Tauranga based which has not been used since 1979 (overnight rest stop) in a wrc (previously mostly Rotorua was used in the area)
I hope the nz motorsport officials do some more spectator education before the (and if the wrc returns) because the wrc is likely to attract new NZ spectators to the stages who have not rally spectated before. (Spectator incidents in NZ for wrc before - McRae hitting the spectator, Auriol near miss with spectator walking across the road in rain storm etc)

[Mk2 RS2000]

A few points. The current Australian wrc round is held at Coffs Harbour which is 600? kilometres north of Sydney.
NZ has lost some of the classic gravel road stages used in past wrc years, the roads have been tar sealed.
I suspect the 2 day 'candidate' event planned for NZ this year is likely to have a moderate amount of touring distance between the special stages. A three day event would likely have a lengthy touring section (by comparison to most current wrc events) at some point in order to get the quality stages and stage distance and possibly require a remote refuel, service, tyre change. The candidate event is Tauranga based which has not been used since 1979 (overnight rest stop) in a wrc (previously mostly Rotorua was used in the area)
I hope the nz motorsport officials do some more spectator education before the (and if the wrc returns) because the wrc is likely to attract new NZ spectators to the stages who have not rally spectated before. (Spectator incidents in NZ for wrc before - McRae hitting the spectator, Auriol near miss with spectator walking across the road in rain storm etc)

Approximate distances from Tauranga to Rotorua 55km, Coromandel 70km, Tokaroa 80km, Raglan 120km, Motu 140km. each of those areas has a number of special stage type roads available. The hub for the Raglan stages could be a lot closer to Hamilton than out on the coast and would reduce quite a bit of traveling. We were spoilt for road choice when we ran three days out of Rotorua. Tauranga is a perfect base for a NZ WRC event.

[racerx1979]

Ive spectated Rally Aus twice in Coffs. Its nowhere near as good as Finland, Germany, Sweden or Mexico. They need to work on better spectator areas

[N.O.T]

another Sintra type event will not be tolerated by the FIA or the suits at other motorsport associations and their insurers.

Insurers...

British autism intensifies....

use bogey times...

LOL

[Allez Andruet]

Poland has actual rally fans.

Fans? You call them fans? Ok, after reading your completely retard posts it's somewhat understandable you call them fans, but listen, true rally fans NEVER risk the reputation of their beloved sport by spectating in places where these so-called fans (i.e. idiots) were standing in Poland. End of story.

[JUF]

Fans? You call them fans? Ok, after reading your completely retard posts it's somewhat understandable you call them fans, but listen, true rally fans NEVER risk the reputation of their beloved sport by spectating in places where these so-called fans (i.e. idiots) were standing in Poland. End of story.

It's pretty much the same as in my home city Hamburg over the last few days (sorry for that comparison). 95% people are peaceful and respectful, 5% are just idiots. And these iditios let the other 95% look like they're idiots aswell. You have to be able to differentiate.
So yes, there are real Polish fans who would never risk the reputation of our sport. But yes, you're right, there are also others (these 5% idiots) who aren't real fans at all. And the organisers HAVE TO BE ABLE to stop them (just as the police should be able to stop violent demonstrants). That's absolutely true.

[Kris82]

Fans standing in dangerous places is a problem of each and every rally. If Poland get kicked out of the calendar, make sure you kick out Mexico as well. Plenty of video footage showing people laying on the inside of the corners inches from passing rally cars. And let's not forget Monte and the death of a fan there. At least in Poland nobody has died in the past years. I'd personally love to see all you smart asses out there as stewards trying to contain a large group of people and see how well you do.

I wouldn't mind Poland dropping out of the calendar. I think home countries of drivers / teams should have priority and it would be nice to see a rally in Estonia instead of Poland.