Rally Croatia 2022

[Sal yet again]

What Neuville did at the weekend is still 'bad', no doubt about it, but compared to what went on before every car had a tracker on it, and every holier-than-thou motorist had a camera phone or dashcam?

Driving standards on road sections in the pre-tracking days (and still in national rallies without tracking) were appalling. People look back fondly on the likes of McRae, Loeb and Gronholm trying to drag damaged cars back to service, far faster than would be 'safe' and in completely unroadworthy condition, and those guys are heroes. Neuville breaks the speed limit on a practically empty dual carriageway and, to some, he's the devil.

Ultimately, as long as there's a sporting reason to break the speed limit on public roads, drivers will do it. Until last weekend, there had never been a sporting penalty for a road section offence - even Ogier only got a fine for having an actual RTA, driving his car at a police officer and then speeding / running red lights in Zagreb (which as mentioned was the same reason Neuville broke the speed limit on Friday). I think this sets a dangerous precedent, and opens the door to teams pointing the finger at each others' drivers for any minor indiscretion on road sections - dangerous driving is dangerous driving, isn't it?

I hope Hyundai follow through with their appeal, and are successful.

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Footage I saw of Neuville looked like a last minute undertake and dive for the slip road which would have been at least six points on my licence in the UK!

I would suspect there are far more instances of speeding and bad driving amongst members of the support caravan for major cycle races than there are on any WRC event or stage rally in general. The problem is we are setting our stall out with a holier than thou approach with this FIA Safety program and yet tacitly accepting that drivers may have to "speed" to catch up time. There are many eyes watching all aspects of motorised sport hoping for an opportunity to highlight its shortcomings and I can guarantee in my own country that the media would rather pick on this type of incident rather than cover the actual rally in their sports sections.