Rally2 (ex-R5) News

[mknight]

At the end he said that yes.

But before Spain the only good and obvious choice is Barum, which might be too early.

[RS]

At the end he said that yes.

But before Spain the only good and obvious choice is Barum, which might be too early.

Barum as zero car again seems likely. I doubt Kopecky would swap to the new car until the title is wrapped up.

Has it even been homologated yet?

[Fast Eddie WRC]

You'd think with the time it's taken producing the new car Skoda would've timed the full competition launch better.

The publicity at their home rally of Barum as the part of the Czech championship and a round of the ERC would've been a great platform.

[mknight]

Well a year ago Hyundai was late (twice delayed I think), and when finally competing the car was both unreliable and slow. Took at least half a year to be competetive.
Surely something Skoda wants to avoid.

Actually I wonder which recent R5 was both competetive and reliable when released?
Polo wasn't reliable
C3 wasn't competetive besides smooth tarmac.

[Sal yet again]

Other than the recent fuel related issues with some examples of the existing car you would expect the Fabia once again to be the class of the field. I had heard some drivers preferring the E1 to the E2 handling wise however results speak for themselves.

They know what they are doing and you only have to look at ewrc results to see which car is winning weekend after weekend. Ford other than in the UK, MSports home market and in the Canary Islands are way behind leaving Hyundai and VW to pick up the pieces.

[Jarek Z]

They know what they are doing and you only have to look at ewrc results to see which car is winning weekend after weekend.

Have a look at the first 12 cars in the Italian gravel championship
https://www.rallylink.it/pdf/classifiche/2022/cirt.pdf

[logic]

You'd think with the time it's taken producing the new car Skoda would've timed the full competition launch better.

The publicity at their home rally of Barum as the part of the Czech championship and a round of the ERC would've been a great platform.

It is not that easy when your suppliers, supplier is backlogged and cant supply any one.It is just how things are at this point.

[RS]

Well a year ago Hyundai was late (twice delayed I think), and when finally competing the car was both unreliable and slow. Took at least half a year to be competetive.
Surely something Skoda wants to avoid.

Actually I wonder which recent R5 was both competetive and reliable when released?
Polo wasn't reliable
C3 wasn't competetive besides smooth tarmac.

Creating a good R5/Rally2 car seems really difficult due to the cost restrictions and requirement for many ‘off the shelf’ parts to be used. Especially considering that the spec is largely locked in apart from a few jokers being allowed you’d think the manufacturers would put more effort into properly testing their cars prior to homologation, but only Skoda seem to bother. They certainly did more testing with the new Fabia than Hyundai (and maybe the others too) did with their Rally1 cars.

[mknight]

Have a look at the first 12 cars in the Italian gravel championship
https://www.rallylink.it/pdf/classifiche/2022/cirt.pdf

At " normal" slow to medium gravel Fabia seems clearly best and it is the most allround for combined championships.

On other specific surfaces it's not so clear to me. Polo still seems to be great on smooth and fast gravel/snow. C3 on tarmac (specially smooth one). Fiesta on wet/slippery tarmac. Maybe not enough starts for new i20 to judge.

[wyler]

Have a look at the first 12 cars in the Italian gravel championship
https://www.rallylink.it/pdf/classifiche/2022/cirt.pdf

honestly, italian gravel championship is not that much of a reference...