New R4 Car - Think Tank

[Fast Eddie WRC]

Why should it die out when there is more and more R5 around every year?

That people cant afford.

[tommeke_B]

I think it's better to have less categories in national and international rallying, but better competition inside those classes. Leave the "allow everything that has wheels" to the amateur level. In Belgium nearly everything that has wheels is allowed, and we see most of those classes are nearly empty, while the competition in R2 and R5 is stronger than ever. No real need for an affordable 4WD class here, apart for some hobby drivers who wouldn't do a national championship anyway.

[Mirek]

That people cant afford.

As discussed already. The price which is or isn't affordable is very relative and it's mostly depending on the prestige of the said championship/class. Unless You spend Your own money on rallying of course.

Since the number of R5 cars (actually competing) has been growing everywhere this class is hardly going to die out.

[Tarmop]

The gap from R2 to R5 is still too big, in terms of performance but mostly price. Sending a youngster from a R2 into R5 has historically shown what can happen...several times, not to mention R5-->WRC. Some don`t manage at all, some take a step back before trying again etc. Not everyone is called Sebastian and from those lucky ones who manage to fight into WRC, not many get to the highest level. Youngsters really need 4wd experience at home, with less stress and smaller funding, idealistically a car they can take to some closer international competitions. One best example is fighting (theoretically, but still) for the WDC at the moment...

But R4 is still too expensive for that middle class. And examples from wealthy countries with several private R5-s running the nationals are not the best indicators...

[Mirek]

I disagree with You. I can see that the R2 - R5 step works very well. I would say near perfect as countless examples show (even here in CZ the good R2 drivers are immediately fast also with R5).

[Tarmop]

Yes, there are exceptions that confirm it plus the fact that they are fast at home, on familiar ground. Then we have the likes of Katsuta, who after several totalled and atleast one destroyed R5 took an impressive win in SWE18 and is going to have a go in the Yaris.
It cost 135k euros to take part in JWRC this season, with a nice prize at the end. How much would have it cost in a rental R5...not counting the possibility of totalling it.

[Rally Power]

What about currently rally absent top manus, like Renault or Fiat, or brands with modest rally past, like Dacia or Kia? Can’t R4 be interesting to them? Once they’re not planning to make a WRC or a R5 car, should they also stop their importers and delaers to get into rally through R4?

For sure R4 is not having a promising start, but it’s a valid category. It can appeal a large numer of importers and private rally costumeurs in Europe, if the FIA decides to promote it in a sensible way, starting by letting R4 cars to run on a different class from R5’s.

Once it was created by the FIA itself, with the purpose to fill the actual gap between R2/R3 and R5, people should recognize R4 as a complementary category and not as an R5 rival.

[dimviii]

guys dont waste your time with r4.

[Mirek]

Yes, there are exceptions that confirm it plus the fact that they are fast at home, on familiar ground. Then we have the likes of Katsuta, who after several totalled and atleast one destroyed R5 took an impressive win in SWE18 and is going to have a go in the Yaris.
It cost 135k euros to take part in JWRC this season, with a nice prize at the end. How much would have it cost in a rental R5...not counting the possibility of totalling it.

Sorry but Katsuta isn't proof for anything. Some drivers never stop crashing (see Meeke), some can never be fast as some others and that's perfectly natural (with Katsuta the real question is why is he going to drive WRC when he achieved nearly nothing with R5). Only minority of the successful WRC drivers drove gr.N cars and if so it was mainly due to the countries they came from (Latvala, Tänak, Paddon), some jumped from 2WD to S2000 (arguably harder to adapt than R5) and than to WRC (Neuville, Mikkelsen, Breen, Lappi, Meeke) and the most successful of them jumped directly from 2WD to WRC (Loeb, Ogier or also Sordo).

[Tarmop]

Because Gr. N died quite a while ago...and many didn`t even find the fundings for that, even nationally. Ireland is full of drivers with different gener. WRCs, because they can. Mikkelsen started with a private WRC (or a few) at the age of 17 because he could etc. If you have the money, then there is no harm in participating with R5 but at the moment it`s mostly a toy for the rich, thankfully many of them can drive.