[WRC] News & Rumours 2018

[Eli]

https://www.autosport.com/wrc/news/1...gier-2018-deal

Let's hope they'll make an announcement soon.

[Allez Andruet]

I don't see how Rally Finland could be any shorter than it is now. But I'd love to have an additional leg driven on Thursday evening on every rally.

It could... not that I'd voluntarily be making it any shorter, but let's just say for the sake of diversity - if Argentina or Mexico could be extended to five-day "marathons" (that would be the modern day equivalent of Safari) by giving away a day from Finland and another one from Sweden, I'd certainly give it a try. In a way that would also make Sweden and Finland more unique by giving them that sprintesque flavor (something that made them both special back in the day). Who knows, it could easily turn out to be the worst idea ever, but I for one would love to see something like that being tested.

Btw, I think Sweden was a 2-day event in 1987, so it's not a completely new thing.

[MrJan]

I would personally love to have longer legs with remote services to get access to a wider selection of stages, but I understand that the service park is important to the business side of rally, and without that there is no rally at all.

I wonder how much the service park actually brings in (in terms of revenue) for the businesses that surround the sport. I also wonder if having a single service is harming the sport. For example, would more people attend Rally GB if it had stages across a wider area (e.g, taking in stages in the North East of England and South East of Scotland, as well Wales). We're unlikely to ever see that again, but it would definitely increase the catchment area. Arguably it would also make the event more interesting, which would attract spectators.

[AnttiL]

I wonder how much the service park actually brings in (in terms of revenue) for the businesses that surround the sport. I also wonder if having a single service is harming the sport. For example, would more people attend Rally GB if it had stages across a wider area (e.g, taking in stages in the North East of England and South East of Scotland, as well Wales). We're unlikely to ever see that again, but it would definitely increase the catchment area. Arguably it would also make the event more interesting, which would attract spectators.

Well the City of Jyväskylä just reported that they made 14 million euros of profit from Rally Finland 2017. If the stages and services would be partly elsewhere, the money would also go elsewhere.

Also, it would be very expensive for the teams to move the service trucks elsewhere during the rally. This is not the 90's anymore. You don't fix a rally car with a sledgehammer in the forest while the driver smokes a cigarette.

[AnttiL]

Btw, I think Sweden was a 2-day event in 1987, so it's not a completely new thing.

Rally Finland was also two days in 2010, except for one super special on the opening day.

If Mexico was 5 days...they would have, what, 20 super specials?

[Andre Oliveira]

Still many questions.

Who will be 3rd Ford M-Sport driver?
Who will be WRC2 M-Sport driver? It will be any?
Who will be Škoda squad?

[ezboy]

Still many questions.

Who will be 3rd Ford M-Sport driver?
Who will be WRC2 M-Sport driver? It will be any?
Who will be Škoda squad?

Suninen (and maybe Camilli sharing a car.)
Loubet, Camilli and Suninen (if not doing the whole season)
Škoda squad's combined age is going to be around ≈ 60 :-)

[the sniper]

This is the quote that I find worst from Mahonen, that shows that he should never be allowed to poison rallying with his opinions again:

“Today’s rallies should be compact and they need a heart and that heart is the service park, where entertainment is offered. We started this centralised service in Finland because we know the city people, they don’t go to forests, so we build the service for them to enjoy the atmosphere for the rally.”

The popularity of rallying has only fallen overall during the 'ever decreasing circles' era of rallying. Nowadays we have events like Rally GB that have the slight freedom to do something slightly out of the box, to reach out and capture the essence of what rallying was about, and fans are being drawn back in. I thought Rally GB was fantastic this year, but to people like Mahonen, for whom rallying as it once was and somewhat is now is viewed to be too much of an inconvenience, they seem desperate to make rallies uninspiring, copy and paste non-events. Each 'event' purely being a different country to set up their posh lorry park! Utterly pathetic... If you want to rally around a service park, go and hang out with the rallycross boys Mahonen!

[RAS007]

This is the quote that I find worst from Mahonen, that shows that he should never be allowed to poison rallying with his opinions again:

“Today’s rallies should be compact and they need a heart and that heart is the service park, where entertainment is offered. We started this centralised service in Finland because we know the city people, they don’t go to forests, so we build the service for them to enjoy the atmosphere for the rally.”

The popularity of rallying has only fallen overall during the 'ever decreasing circles' era of rallying. Nowadays we have events like Rally GB that have the slight freedom to do something slightly out of the box, to reach out and capture the essence of what rallying was about, and fans are being drawn back in. I thought Rally GB was fantastic this year, but to people like Mahonen, for whom rallying as it once was and somewhat is now is viewed to be too much of an inconvenience, they seem desperate to make rallies uninspiring, copy and paste non-events. Each 'event' purely being a different country to set up their posh lorry park! Utterly pathetic... If you want to rally around a service park, go and hang out with the rallycross boys Mahonen!

Agreed. This is total bullshit. This "cloverleaf" format has always been a load of bollocks. Pretty soon we'll be using 2 stages 10 times each.

[er88]

This is the quote that I find worst from Mahonen, that shows that he should never be allowed to poison rallying with his opinions again:

“Today’s rallies should be compact and they need a heart and that heart is the service park, where entertainment is offered. We started this centralised service in Finland because we know the city people, they don’t go to forests, so we build the service for them to enjoy the atmosphere for the rally.”

The popularity of rallying has only fallen overall during the 'ever decreasing circles' era of rallying. Nowadays we have events like Rally GB that have the slight freedom to do something slightly out of the box, to reach out and capture the essence of what rallying was about, and fans are being drawn back in. I thought Rally GB was fantastic this year, but to people like Mahonen, for whom rallying as it once was and somewhat is now is viewed to be too much of an inconvenience, they seem desperate to make rallies uninspiring, copy and paste non-events. Each 'event' purely being a different country to set up their posh lorry park! Utterly pathetic... If you want to rally around a service park, go and hang out with the rallycross boys Mahonen!

Well said, couldn't have put it better myself.

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