2023 WRC and Off Road Discussion *includes 'Dakar' *

[SBan83]

Bottom post of the previous page:

That was a very fun rally. Tänak richly deserved that, too bad Breen couldn't keep up, but very funny how Hyundai's team orders failed.

Yes, Abiteboul's expression was priceless when Breen clocked that time.

[Everso Biggyballies]

Some good news for the future.


The Acropolis Rally in Greece is to remain a permanent fixture of the FIA World Rally Championship until “at least” 2025 ....
..... after the terms of a two-year contract extension were agreed on Wednesday.

Universally known as The Rally of the Gods, the gravel event’s near decade long absence from the series ended in March 2021 when Greek ministers and World Rally Championship bosses signed a multi-year agreement.

First held in 1951, the Acropolis Rally joined the World Rally Championship season in its inaugural season in 1973. Winners include the late Colin McRae MBE – the most successful driver with a total of five victories to his name – as well as Sebastien Loeb, Carlos Sainz, Juha Kankkunen and Walter Rohrl.

[Cheeveer]

The Safari this weekend, one of the highlights of the season.

Full entry list: https://www.wrc.com/en/news/2023/wrc/en ... lly-kenya/

[Everso Biggyballies]

The Safari this weekend, one of the highlights of the season.

Full entry list: https://www.wrc.com/en/news/2023/wrc/en ... lly-kenya/

Yeah, even though its much neutered from the original its great to see it return a couple of years ago. Although not the event it was it is still a unique challenge. I think Lappi is actually a Safari virgin so will have a bigger challenge than others. Already Katsuda made a big mess of his Toyota when he tried to roll it into a ball in the shakedown. I believe the car has been resurrected and will start.

[Cheeveer]

Nice to see plenty of domestic entries on the starting line. Seems to be really a major event for the locals, as any world championship should be.

Time schedule: https://www.wrc.com/en/news/2023/rally- ... -sardegna/
(URL says Italia but the times are correct for the Safari)

[Everso Biggyballies]

Rovanpera seemed comfortable with everything in the shakedown.

https://www.wrc.com/en/news/2023/wrc/ro ... edown-win/

Shakedown Highlights

[Everso Biggyballies]

SS1 (;head to head' super special stage Kasarani) is over for the WRC1 guys.
Tänak leads by just 0.1 over Ogier.


WRC2 and Solberg has a decent lead of 3.7 secs.

Early days yet


STANDINGS AFTER SS1:

POS. DRIVER TIME
1. Tänak Ford 3min 14.3sec
2. Ogier Toyota +0.1sec
3. Rovanperä Toyota +2.4sec
4. Neuville Hyundai +2.7sec
5. Evans Toyota +3.3sec
6. Lappi Hyundai +4.0sec


Highlights SS1




Rovanperä vs Neuville - Head-to-Head! | WRC Safari Rally Kenya 2023

[Everso Biggyballies]

Ogier pulls clear of Rovanpera, Neuville retires

Day 2 Highlights



Stunning Heli Footage! | WRC Safari Rally Kenya 2023

[Everso Biggyballies]

Ogier wins Safari.

Ogier and co-driver Vincent Landais came under pressure from championship leader Rovanpera across Sunday’s final six stages to clinch his third win of a partial 2023 WRC campaign by 6.7s. The margin was the closest in the event’s 70-year history.

Strong championship points by finishing second, after Rovanpera continued to push on Sunday, reducing the gap to 8.1s, before Ogier responded by winning stage 15, despite losing his rear wing and tailgate after clipping a tree. A garbage bin liner was used to keep the dust out

The gap continued to fluctuate until 9.2s separated the pair ahead of the final stage, but Ogier clung on, despite a rock damaging his car, to seal victory.

Neuville gave a reliability and incident challenged Hyundai something to go home with by winning the power stge at the end. Mind you he wrecked his suspension on Saturday and had to rejoin. Dani Sordo led Hyundai’s charge to finish fifth (+5m05.4s) although his rally wasn’t helped when he became lost in his own dust on Friday prior to a power steering issue that struck on Sunday.

M Sport started strongly with Tanak the early pacesetter but it all unravelled from there. Punctures and animals not helping. Tanak finished 6th in the end.

Rovanpera could only the muster the third fastest time on the powerstage due to a lack of power from his car, but extended his championship lead to 37 points.

Toyota ended with a 1-2-3-4 finish ! Elfyn Evans and Takamoto Katsuta finished third and fourth.

Apparently a close run thing though as all the Toyota engines were overheating badly at the end due to the choking Fesh Fesh dust.


WRC Safari Rally Kenya - top 10 results

Cla Driver Time Gap
1 Sébastien Ogier 3h30m42.5s
2 Kalle Rovanperä 3h30m49.3s 6.7s
3 Elfyn Evans 3h33m41.1s 2m58.6s
4 Takamoto Katsuta 3h34m06.3s 3m23.8s
5 Dani Sordo 3h35m48.0s 5m05.5s
6 Ott Tänak 3h39m57.0s 9m14.5s
7 P-L.Loubet 3h46m58.3s 16m15.8s
8 Thierry Neuville 3h55m29.5s 24m47.0s
9 K.Kajetanowicz 3h57m16.0s 26m33.5s
10 Oliver Solberg 3h57m46.5s 27m04.0s

[Everso Biggyballies]

It all just got even worse for Hyundai!

Neuville disqualified from Safari

Hyundai’s Thierry Neuville has had his eighth-place finish and world championship points haul from the Safari Rally Kenya Power Stage scrubbed for a breach of reconnaissance regulations.

On Sunday evening, Neuville and co-driver Martijn Wydaeghe were informed of the decision by officials to disqualify them as “a person connected with the crew of car #11 travelled on or over the route of two special stages, after reconnaissance, without authorisation”.

. Article 35.4.2 of the 2023 FIA WRC Sporting Regulations, states that: “After the publication of the Supplementary Regulations, only with the express authorisation of the Clerk of the Course and the FIA Rally Department may any person connected with an entered crew travel on or over the route of a special stage of the rally (except on foot). This rule shall apply until that special stage is terminated, open for public traffic and will no longer be used within the rally.”

In his evidence, the Belgian is said to have “promptly admitted” that “he was aware of the identified person and that he had requested this person’s support in identifying specific concerns (areas where rocks had moved) in some special stages that the crew will be required to compete on.”

The official notification continued: “The driver presented an honest synopsis of the situation and apologized to the stewards for his lapse in judgement. The driver took the onus of responsibility for this infringement.”

The co-driver “highlighted the crew’s concern when it comes to the safe navigation of the challenging routes and how they perceive some ambiguity to what constitutes corner-cutting and the anti-cutting measures that the organizer was perceived to have introduced following reconnaissance.”

In closing, the stewards said they “acknowledged and accepted the honesty and feedback on the part of the crew and viewed that the crew may have been misguided in mitigating safety with actions that are in breach of the regulations”.

Despite the co-operation shown by Hyundai Motorsport’s leading crew, it was not enough to prevent them from being erased from the overall results.

With the loss of nine points, Neuville slips from second to sixth in the title race


Edit: In further Steward penalty related news.....Solberg Penalised for a Tyre Infraction

(Good news is that it makes no difference to Oliver's result.)

Oliver Solberg and co-driver Elliott Edmondson were penalised two minutes for using one tyre more than their allotted number of 26. The two minute penalty had no impact on the pairing's overall standing with Martin Prokop still nearly nine minutes in arrears.

[Everso Biggyballies]

So, revised results

POS CAR NO DRIVER CO-DRIVER TEAM / CAR ELIGIBILITY STAGE TIME TOTAL TIME DIFF 1ST
1 #17 FRA S. OGIER FRA V. LANDAIS GR Yaris Rally1 HYBRID M 3:30:42.5 3:30:42.5
2 #69 FIN K. ROVANPERÄ FIN J. HALTTUNEN GR Yaris Rally1 HYBRID M 3:30:49.2 3:30:49.2 +6.7
3 #33 GBR E. EVANS GBR S. MARTIN GR Yaris Rally1 HYBRID M 3:33:41.0 3:33:41.0 +2:58.5
4 #18 JPN T. KATSUTA IRL A. JOHNSTON GR Yaris Rally1 HYBRID 3:34:06.3 3:34:06.3 +3:23.8
5 #6 ESP D. SORDO ESP C. CARRERA i20 N Rally1 HYBRID M 3:35:37.9 3:35:47.9 +5:05.4
6 #8 EST O. TÄNAK EST M. JÄRVEOJA Puma Rally1 HYBRID M 3:39:56.9 3:39:56.9 +9:14.4
7 #7 FRA P. LOUBET BEL N. GILSOUL Puma Rally1 HYBRID M 3:46:58.2 3:46:58.2 +16:15.7
8 #21 POL K. KAJETANOWICZ POL M. SZCZEPANIAK Fabia Evo WRC2 (DC/CC) 3:57:15.9 3:57:15.9 +26:33.4
9 #20 SWE O. SOLBERG GBR E. EDMONDSON Fabia Evo 3:57:46.5 3:59:46.5 +29:04.0
10 #23 CZE M. PROKOP CZE Z. JURKA Fiesta Mk II WRC2 (DC/CC) 4:08:43.6 4:08:43.6 +38:01.1
11 #26 KEN C. TUNDO KEN T. JESSOP Fabia WRC2 (DC/CC) 4:11:38.6 4:11:38.6 +40:56.1
12 #4 FIN E. LAPPI FIN J. FERM i20 N Rally1 HYBRID M 4:12:47.4 4:12:57.4 +42:14.9


Revised Championship points
POS DRIVER TOTAL
1 K. ROVANPERA 140
2 E. EVANS. 99
3= S. OGIER. 98
3= O. TÄNAK 98
5 T. NEUVILLE 93
6 LAPPI. 69
7 D. SORDO. 46
8 T. KATSUTA. 35

[Cheeveer]

European Rally Championship is in Värmland, Sweden this weekend, on the roads that the old WRC Rally Sweden were on. Tomorrow the power stage will be decided on Colin's Crest, but for the first time ever completely on gravel! Oliver Solberg leads over Haydon Paddon, got to say that the competition in the R5 category is just immense. Drivers like Mads Ostberg and Ole-Christian Veiby and Nikolai Gryazin are nowhere in this field. Great stuff, really recommend y'all to watch tomorrow. If you got the WRC+ subscription, ERC is included in that.

[Cheeveer]

The Colin's Crest record was broken! Ok, it was on gravel now, but Mads Ostberg went 46 meters on the jump!

Rally will end this afternoon with another loop through Colin's.

[Cheeveer]

Oliver Solberg is really redeeming himself this year. Totally in control and wins Rally Värmland.

[Cheeveer]

Rally Finland about to start! The last two editions has been amazing, especially last year with Tänak's furious charge. He is in high spirit, after a pre-rally penalty screwed him over last time out in Estonia. Looking forward to this one.

[Cheeveer]

Tänak fastest at Harju. Not surprised. The rally starts in earnest tomorrow morning.