Posts

What's new for the WRC from 2025 and beyond

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  The World Motorsport Council has concluded, and some very important decisions have been taken for the future of the WRC and rallying as a whole. Here's what was decided: On the Promotion side: In order to leverage promotional opportunities around each event and maximise the WRC’s full potential, the FIA will establish a WRC Promotion Team within the FIA in close collaboration with stakeholders from the WRC Promoter, event organisers and manufacturer teams. The WRC Promotion Team’s key focus will be to develop a WRC Charter that will define a set of commitments from all stakeholders to promote the WRC to a wider audience against an agreed set of objectives and KPIs. This coordinated approach will leverage the expertise of each party in order to promote the WRC outside its current fan base as one of the foremost motor sport championships in the world. A new Promotion team will be introduced On the Sporting Regulations: Event organisers will be given more freedom when developing the...

Taking a look at what a potential 2025 WRC calendar will look like

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  This has to be the earliest we've ever had this many rumors about the upcoming season's calendar. In this post we will be examining every country vying for a slot in the WRC's upcoming calendar(s), and also taking a look at what rallies they'll be potentially replacing.  The 2024 WRC calendar, pic from the FIA's website The countries with the more serious bids are, Ireland, Paraguay, Estonia, USA and Saudi Arabia. Other countries have also expressed interest, namely Argentina, Spain and more recently the UK announced they'd be interested in bringing Rally GB  back,  in Scotland. Argentina's bid was a very serious one, being considered a lock for the 2025 calendar, with the Argentines narrowingly missing out on a 2024 slot to Poland. Unfortunately for them, their new government has massively cut down on spending, meaning Motorsport events are in the bottom of their priority list, something which was reaffirmed with the cancelation of their 2024 MotoGP round...

5 Rally Sweden Moments you Forgot!

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  The next stop in the WRC calendar is Sweden, the only snow rally of the season! Sweden has been part of the calendar in all but 3 seasons, and is a rally with rich history. Understandably, when a rally is synonymous with the WRC like with Sweden, there many moments that are forgotten by even the most hardcore of WRC fans. But fear not, because I am here to remind you of 5 Rally Sweden moments that you might have forgotten about! Without further ado, let's get into the list! 2006 - Gigi and Daniel fight for their maiden podium  2006 was a transitional season for the WRC. With only 2 fully fledged manufacturers in the series (a far cry from the 6 of the previous year) and with Subaru being far too uncompetitive, there were only two drivers who you could realistically expect to consistently win rallies, Marcus Gronholm in the Ford and Sebastien Loeb in the privateer Xsara. Because Subaru's 2006 challenger was so awful, the last place of the podium was often up for grabs for pri...

Let's take a closer look at the WRC's New Rally format for 2025

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  It was last Tuesday when I got a notification on my phone that Rally Sardegna's Rally Guide had come out. "Alright", I said, "can't be anything too crazy in there". But there was, checking the itinerary, I saw the total and it was only 266km! Huh? Did I miss a day or something? Nope, that was it. After taking a closer look there was this quote by the organizers that intrigued me: "The 21st Rally Italia Sardegna presents a compact route based on the new FIA guidelines from 2025, with only three days of racing." So this 266km edition of Rally Sardegna, could be what the future WRC rallies will be like for the upcoming season. So, let's take a closer look at what this "48 hour Rally'' format is, and let's examine its positives and negatives.  A map of the 2024 edition of Rally Sardegna from Rally Maps. Check the full maps here So let's start with what the thinking behind this new format is. The rally now starts a day later f...

5 Rally Monte Carlo Moments you Forgot!

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  The start of the 2024 season is upon us! Is everyone as excited as I am? I hope so! Rally Monte Carlo is the traditional start of the WRC season, and it’s given us countless moments to remember. So many, that we forget some wink wink. So that’s why I am here, to give you a list of 5 Rally Monte Carlo moments that you’ve probably forgotten about! Without further ado, let’s get into the list! 2008 – Atkinson vs Duval in the Monaco Circuit Picture from Motorsport.com For 2007 and 2008, the Rally Monte Carlo organizers held an SSS at the Monaco circuit, which was quite cool to see! In 2008, the spectator stage was the last stage of the rally, and it was quite eventful. In the principality super special , there would be a battle between Subaru’s Chris Atkinson and Stobart Ford’s Francois Duval for the last podium place. The pair were separated by 20s heading to Sunday. On Sunday, the rally moved away from Valence and back to the classic stages around Col De Turini. Duval wa...

Top 30 Stages in WRC History: 1-5

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  The poll is closed, and the results are ready to be announced! We asked you for your favorite WRC stages and you had your say. Each voter selected 15 stages out of a pool of 100, and the 30 stages that had the most votes, combined with our experts’ ratings made it to our list. This was a collaboration between us and Antti from  itgetsfasternow.com , this list wouldn’t have been possible without him, so please go check his blog. He will have his own unique post based on this list when all the stages are revealed. Throughout this month we’ll be going through the results, and this is the final part, these are the last 5 stages! So here we go: 5 – Whaanga Coast – Rally New Zealand We start out our Top 5 with Rally New Zealand’s Whaanga Coast. This sea-side gravel road is a legendary Rally New Zealand stage, and a favourite among drivers and fans alike. Whaanga Coast first appeared in the WRC back in 1990. Debuting as Whaanga ...