[WRC] News & Rumours 2019

[EstWRC]

What I heard in Sweden was not like that, many teams are again considering Autoglym rally in Finland but we will see...

Well, Aava confirmed on Friday, when they signed the contracts with Ciesla, that all the 4 teams will be here with one driver from each team.

Theres a long interview with Ciesla in estonian newspaper, first i thought i will translate the whole thing but then i changed my mind and i will point out the most interesting parts.

- says that in long perspective this contract with Rally Estonia doesnt mean much, and at the moment it isnt possible because the priority is to go outside europe: Africa, Asia, North-America and Middle-East.

- the feedback last year from teams was very positive and thats why they decided to do it again and bigger this time. the roads are similar to finland and the teams can do good preparation.

- about the idea to have rotation in the calendar: he says the idea is very good, because we could get more countries and events in the calendar, but for the organisers it is very difficult because they have to keep their money, sponsors, and workers also the year they are not having the rally. so, great idea but not sustainable.

- his ideal goal is to have 16 rallies on the calendar but says that they have the same opinion with teams, their budgets are limited.

- since he mentioned that he wants to have 16 rallies, the reporter right away asks if it would mean shorter rallies? Ciesla: no, not at all. We have done the calculations many times and it wont change the costs for the teams. They still would have to bring as many parts to the rallies as now and be there as many days as now. For the organisers it would mean less costs but also less profit because there are less stages. At the moment this plan doesnt interest no one anymore because they cant see how it would be profitable.

- in the end theres a question: how we would get more car makers into the series? he doesnt say anything special there, points out that they have to make the series very attractive to them. Also says that they have to go to the countries where we have big car markets and hints also to the hybrid technology.