Will WRC ever return to it's Glory days?

[FAS33]

I gotta admit, I casually watch WRC or any rallying series for that matter, but the driving skills required to drive in the conditions they do make F1 drivers look lame. here in Aus we get snippets of coverage on the telly on Motor Mate, I enjoy the clips and although it happened years ago, it took balls to drive like they did back then in little next to no safety in those days.

but now it seems like WRC have gone backwards, what happened? apart from a guy destroying the competition year after year, that happened in F1 but it's still going strong.

[crossfades]

Also thought of this myself ..

Costs, money, technology, greed, business and maybe even FIA are some of the things I've heard from my dad who used to work for Toyota's WRC team as a mechanic. He has a lot of good points

[Greg Cozier]

No, the commercial relevance is gone. Car buyers don't travel far from their homes to be entertained, don't usually drive on gravel and forest roads and don't relate to the models being raced.

If rallying was all on tarmac, involved 'aspirational' GT cars and kept in loops close to city centres it might become commercially relevant again.

The current gravel rallying events should be kept and converted to SUV rallying similar to Dakar, there is more commercial relevance there.

[crossfades]

Yes, the commercial relevance and you're thinking is a good point. Maybe the commercial relevance has gone down. But not enough to bring down the WRC. How big aren't the costs nowadays? Or how many privateers has the money to race a championship? And if there is privateers rallying, I think it's hard to believe they race because of commercial relevance.

You say car buyers don't travel far from their homes for entertainment. Is the WRC supposed to reach out to just them?

200 000 travels to the cold Swedish Rally just to experience the highest acknowledged series of rallying. In Finland even half a million. I don't think they care about cars being rallied, only that they get to see the rallying. Of course it matters that there is manufactures that makes it more professional and exiting for fans. But not so all of them gets interested in their cars.

Rob Gordon used to race a Hummer in the Dakar. Then they went out of business. SUVs are pretty expensive, hard to make a real market directed to regular people. Lotus built a rally car for tarmac purpose last year and owns a part of a Formula 1 team with there name. They are close to getting out of business.

So in the end, money has a big importance nowadays

[ArnageWRC]

I could write paragraphs, pages on were it has gone wrong.

It tried to become F1's dirty cousin "F1 in the forests"...... under the leadership of Dave Richards - who tried to ape everything that F1 did - and turn it to Rallying.
Same event format, Friday - Sunday, 9-5 hours, repeated stages, single service park......fine in theory. Simply didn't work.

Take our WRC event, as was; the RAC Rally - all over the country, visiting places and people who would never normally interact with the sport. And hundreds of thousands came out to watch, TV, Radio & newspapers were full of it. Publicity, just what the sport & Manufacturers want. Remember, they're in it to sell more cars.

So, what did they do? Moved it to a small part of Wales, charged silly prices - and wonder why the event is not a success.......Very little media coverage anymore, and small crowd numbers.......

As for road relevance - well quite simply, there isn't very much. How many family cars are 4WD? How many people use gravel roads on their journeys? Who really aspires to own a Polo, Fiesta or DS3.......

£200,000 - £300,000+ for a WRCar is just silly money - and can only be bought/rented from the factory/ team.

If it was up to me I'd have an even split between gravel & tarmac, with lightweight 2WD cars able to take on heavier 4WD cars over a full season - due to the split in surfaces.
I'd also have all the 'Classics'; Sanremo, Corsica, Acropolis, Monte, NZ, etc should always be on the WRC calendar. At the moment we have far too many dry, dusty, gravel events - all far to samey and offering nothing.

I could go on, but I won't....... for now.....

[crossfades]

So what about manufactures hiring private companies (like Prodrive and M-sport) to develop and run cars with their name? Subaru, Hyundai (Accent), Ford etc. Any opinions?

I hope @ArnageWRC "could go on" with an opinion

[jeast]

I think they just need better cars.

[crossfades]

Originally Posted by jeast

I think they just need better cars.

What do you mean exactly?

They develop the cars themselves, even if they are professional. Also they are private which means they can put money in their own pockets. Just look at Mini. BMW cut off their deal with Prodrive because of financial problems. M-Sport too. They haven't won a single driver championship, despite being around since 1997 and being the most experienced team. M-Sport is a reason to not have private companies develop cars and running cars in manufactures names according to few guys I know. If a manufacture want's to win they should do it properly themselves and have there own team. Hyundai has taken lessons from it

[rs 200]

Answer is no ,the spectacle has gone from all motorsport ,cars are just to boring now they all have too much grip and so little power these days ,
until the fia stop health and safety everything ,you might as well watch trains
f1 back in the day too much power not enough grip ,touring cars, rally cars ,rallycross , all were the same.
as said rallying needs to be on roads in towns cities etc to get close to joe public .uk never going to happen ,Ireland every weekend and what good rallying they have .

[chunder]

Local rallyins is good all over Europe, Estonia, Belgium Holland, Germany, France

Why? Coz they close the roads and allow pretty much anything to compete either in class, or historic and they have rallysprints to get people involved

AS usual our MSA are utterly pathetic at any of this and take the money and run as they have for decades.

[jeast]

Originally Posted by crossfades

What do you mean exactly?

They develop the cars themselves, even if they are professional. Also they are private which means they can put money in their own pockets. Just look at Mini. BMW cut off their deal with Prodrive because of financial problems. M-Sport too. They haven't won a single driver championship, despite being around since 1997 and being the most experienced team. M-Sport is a reason to not have private companies develop cars and running cars in manufactures names according to few guys I know. If a manufacture want's to win they should do it properly themselves and have there own team. Hyundai has taken lessons from it

Rally cross cars are more exciting and have more power. They need more exciting cars maybe something other than just ecoboxs IMO.

[jeast]

Originally Posted by rs 200

Answer is no ,the spectacle has gone from all motorsport ,cars are just to boring now they all have too much grip and so little power these days ,
until the fia stop health and safety everything ,you might as well watch trains
f1 back in the day too much power not enough grip ,touring cars, rally cars ,rallycross , all were the same.

Very true I wish the FIA and all the other governing bodies would stop making everything spec too.

[crossfades]

Rallycross cars are too powerful and also built for short racing. I'm sure many would like to see them in a rally but that's not good I think.

Having them in WRC would just rise the costs also, the cars allowing to be built more freely and with less regulations than the current WRC regulations. A WRC car with an rallycross engine would also be too fast and hard to control.

But you're right about the cars, they aren't that exiting even if they are still as fast as the cars used before this 1.6 liter era. Would be more exiting with sedans too and a little more roar to the engine and a little less technology

[mikuni]

I think the current cars are a huge step up from the boring 2 litre cars, packed full of traction control and ABS. Personally, that is what I believe killed WRC. The current cars are far more exciting to watch and they sound a hell of a lot better in the flesh. If anything, I wonder if they can turn the wick up a little bit to get 350bhp+ out of them like they are talking about (or have done to the FIA engine) in WTCC.

I go to the WRC every time it returns to NZ (every second year) and here, it is returning to its roots. Going back to some of the original roads, with remote service and everything. I feel like WRC is slowly heading back to where it was in the 90's and sure it will take some time, but as more manufacturers come back it will get back to its heyday.

[AndyS]

Can the WRC return to its glory days? Not in its current guise. The people running it and the FIA are obsessed with making the events shorter and trying to package it for TV. They've been trying for over 10 years and still the penny hasn't dropped, IT DOESN'T WORK. The WRC was at its height when the rallies were longer and covered much more ground because it was more accessible to a larger number of people.

The cars don't inspire people anymore. The FIA seem determined that they should all fit into a standard cookie cutter format. I agree that they are improvement on the last generation WRC's though and think the current power levels are sufficient. There needs to be more variety and freedom and most importantly the cars need to be more road relevant though. There was nothing better than seeing the 2WD 306 F2 cars beating up the 4WD's on tarmac in the 90's. They need to be desirable and possible for people to own one and drive it on the road. None of the current cars will be seen as icons in the future like the Ford Escort, Lancia Stratos, Audi Quattro, Escort Cosworth, Impreza etc.

The FIA hold it back by seemingly insisting that all other motor sport must play second fiddle to F1 rather than letting it compete. Finally, as with most top line motor sports there not run by motor sport people anymore. The people at the top are there to make money via sponsorship and TV deals etc. As long as they are doing that then they all think they are doing a fantastic job. Meanwhile the sport is stripped bare, but that's modern business and the world we live in now I'm afraid.

[ArnageWRC]

Pretty accurate post that!!

What annoys me is being told to stop living in the past - and that the new improved 'WRC-Lite' is the way to go. There is already a quick, short form of Rallying; Rallycross.

All the WRC needed at the end of the 90's was a few tweaks - not the wholescale destruction it got.

I can't see it ever returning to it's heyday - but hope I'm wrong.

[AndyS]

Originally Posted by ArnageWRC

What annoys me is being told to stop living in the past.

I can't see it ever returning to it's heyday - but hope I'm wrong.

Never say never, it can but not in its current form and until somebody realises that it'll stagger on as a fringe sport. Or more to the point if somebody with the sports best interests at heart not making money is in charge.

Sometimes change is necessary but other times change seems to happen only for changes sake or for somebody to justify their existence/role and it seems the WRC is a classic example of that.