PTRACER wrote:17 entries for STC is more than the WTCC are getting this year.
Apparently only 15 cars are entered for the opening round at Marrakesh. I think the words "oh dear" are appropriate.
I've said it before, and I'll say it again. The WTCC is irrelevant. The world championship doesn't carry enough weight to be a factor for teams and cars anymore. Even on national levels, tin-top racing isn't what is used to be. They failed to produce something exciting after the Super Tourers were scrapped. The BTCC up until 2000 was a behemoth, and when they scrapped the super tourers, nothing that has come since has been remotely as exciting. Their main competitor is DTM, which is way more awesome sauce than the WTCC.
The WTCC is irrelevant because the rules set is irrelevant. WTCC is going through similar to STCC. The rules may look and sound attractive yet they don't attract manufacturer longevity for the series and the cars are too expensive for most privateers to either build themselves or buy as a year old model.
Let's remember that the WTCC only restarted (about 10-12 years ago) because the ETCC wanted to be recognized as a global series and do a couple of global races (Macau, Brazil, Mexico...) and the ETCC was created a couple of years beforehand because local series in France, Italy and Germany were struggling to maintain good entry numbers so organisers decided to merge those series into EuroSTC.
If you are a privateer team then for the cost of WTCC there are other series to choose from, maybe not touring cars. Blancpain, WEC, Belcar, 24hr Endurance Series, British GT, the list goes on.
kals wrote:If you are a privateer team then for the cost of WTCC there are other series to choose from, maybe not touring cars. Blancpain, WEC, Belcar, 24hr Endurance Series, British GT, the list goes on.
Creventic started the 24H Endurance Series because they wanted to give privateers a possibility to race on proper circuits for a very reasonable price. That is why they use the, at first sight silly looking, standard fuel pump rigs, so teams don't have to buy a fuel rig for them self.
It is a very open series. That is why it allows GT3 cars to compete too. But when you have a proper race car, and you want to race on a proper race track/series, you can go to Creventic. And if there is no specific class for your car, they will create one.
Brian Redman: "Mr. Fangio, how do you come so fast?" "More throttle, less brakes...."
PTRACER wrote:17 entries for STC is more than the WTCC are getting this year.
Apparently only 15 cars are entered for the opening round at Marrakesh. I think the words "oh dear" are appropriate.
I've said it before, and I'll say it again. The WTCC is irrelevant. The world championship doesn't carry enough weight to be a factor for teams and cars anymore. Even on national levels, tin-top racing isn't what is used to be. They failed to produce something exciting after the Super Tourers were scrapped. The BTCC up until 2000 was a behemoth, and when they scrapped the super tourers, nothing that has come since has been remotely as exciting. Their main competitor is DTM, which is way more awesome sauce than the WTCC.
And now the DTM has announced an 18-car grid for 2017. It gets worse and worse. Endurance racing seems to be prospering quite nicely, but touring car racing is falling off a cliff in all corners of the globe.
The 2010s = the worst decade for motorsport since the 1940s.
At twitter the DTM has some 32k followers. You would expect the WTCC would have multiple figures of that. No. Only 3 times of that. 94k.
Go to FIA WEC series: 191,000
Go to Imsa series: 98,000
Go to WTCC: 94,000
Go to DTM: 32,000
Go to Blancpain GT series: 25,000
Go to Creventic 24h series: 13,500
Brian Redman: "Mr. Fangio, how do you come so fast?" "More throttle, less brakes...."
STCC visits Finland for the first time this weekend. 20 cars on the grid in Alastaro. Lilja didn't get his finances in order, Andreas Andersson couldn't repair his car in time, and Kottulinsky is racing in ADAC GT Masters, but Ekblom is there in a 3rd KMS VW Golf and Finnish LMS Racing have all 5 cars there, and Joonas Lappalainen makes his first appearance.
***Some say you should live each day like it was your last... but who wants to live each day in wild panic and extreme death anxiety?
The universe, look at the hugeness of it... it is a dizzying thought that little ol' me is the centre of it all!***
The Norisring delivers again.
Absolutely insane finish to an entertaining second race with a very lucky Edo Mortara sneaking into 3rd position in the last corner.
Karlskoga Gelleråsen's "Kanonloppet" ("Cannon Race") is this weekend. Fingers are really itching to go. It's STCC's blue riband event, if any. Lot's of support classes, including Carrera Cup, Swedish GT and Legends cars. 22 cars are entered for STCC and 15 in Swedish GT, the biggest GT field I can ever remember since around 2000!