New rules for the 2017 World Rally Championship will see more powerful cars and other changes. Power will increase from the current 300bhp or so to 380bhp, due to a larger 36mm turbo restrictor. 2017 cars will be 25kg lighter Electronically-controlled centre differentials A new aero package, will allow a larger rear wing, 55mm increase in width and an increase in overhangs at the front and rear 2017 WRC Calendar 1. Monte-Carlo 19 - 22 January 2. Sweden 9 - 12 February 3. Mexico 9 - 12 March 4. France 6 - 9 April 5. Argentina 27 - 30 April 6. Portugal 18 - 21 May 7. Italy 8 - 11 June 8. Poland 29 June - 2 July 9. Finland 27 - 30 July 10. Germany 17 - 20 August 11. Spain 5 - 8 October 12. Great Britain 26 - 29 October 13. Australia 16 - 19 November
There will be 4 factory teams competing in the top WRC class in 2017 M-Sport Ford Fiesta WRC Due to Volkswagen's sudden and late withdrawal from the WRC, the driver market went into meltdown at the end of last year. All of a sudden, Sebastien Ogier, the current (and 4 times consecutive) world rally champion was on the market. Malcolm Wilson won Ogier over, so M-Sport will be running car number 1 for this season, quite a coup for the Cumbria based team Ott Tanak is also making a return as an official M-Sport driver, after spending a year with a DMACK sponsored Ford in 2016 Car number 3 will be another M-Sport car for the British pairing of Elfyn Evans & Dan Barritt, Evans spent last year in the WRC2 class, but he is back in the top flight for 2017 Evans will be running on DMACK tyres (Ogier and Tanak will be running on Michelin)
Citroen made limited appearances in 2016, instead concentrating on developing their 2017 car Citroen C3 WRC
Finaly, Toyota are making a return to the WRC after a long absence. The team will be run by the legendary 4 time world rally champion Tommi Makinen Most teams seem to have gone with the freedon of rules on the aero front, whether this proves sensible on lose surface events, where cars are cutting corners heavily, remains to be seen....
As already mentioned at the start of this thread, VW pulled out of the WRC at the end of 2016, this was due to their global emissions scandal, the board of VW decided the brand couldn't be seen pouring Champagne over cars and running a factory team, when they were paying out billions in compensation and laying thousands of employees off worldwide. They did however spend a huge amount of time and money developing a 2017 spec car, the team carried on testing right up to the end of 2016. There was a rumour that Nasser Al-Attiyah had been working on a plan to run the 2017 VWs with Qatar money backing the team, but they ran out of time and missed the deadline. The potential team are still talking to the FIA about is an exceptional waiver for homologation, and may still appear on the championship later this year. Here is a photo of the team in northern Sweden, taken in December 2016, completing the homologation process, official test driver and 2 time WRC champion Marcus Grönholm can be seen in the white overalls Interesting that VW looked to have gone with a much more simple (and robust?) aero package than the other teams
2017 Monte Carlo Rally seeded entry list 1 Sebastien Ogier/Julien Ingrassia Ford Fiesta WRC 2 Ott Tanak/Martin Jarveoja Ford Fiesta WRC 3 Elfyn Evans/Dan Barritt Ford Fiesta WRC 4 Hayden Paddon/John Kennard Hyundai i20 Coupe WRC 5 Thierry Neuville/Nicolas Gilsoul Hyundai i20 Coupe WRC 6 Dani Sordo/Marc Marti Hyundai i20 Coupe WRC 7 Kris Meeke/Paul Nagle Citroen C3 WRC 8 Stephane Lefebvre/Gabin Moreau Citroen C3 WRC 10 Jari-Matti Latvala/Miikka Anttila Toyota Yaris WRC 11 Juho Hanninen/Kaj Lindstrom Toyota Yaris WRC 12 Craig Breen/Scott Martin DS3 WRC 20 Jourdan Serderidis/Frederic Miclotte DS 3 WRC 31 Andreas Mikkelsen/Anders Jaerger Skoda Fabia R5 32 Jan Kopecky/Pavel Dresler Skoda Fabia R5 21 François Delecour/Dominique Savignoni Abarth 124 RGT
Paddon went off on stage 1, unfortunately he hit a spectator , who has since died. Seemingly the spectator was standing on the outside of a corner, with his back against a rock face, with nowhere to go. There are some reports on other forums that he was asked not to stand in this restricted area but yet continued to do so.
The 2017 WRC began with a new start, new cars, driver switches, the most significant of all was M-Sport's signing of Ogier M-Sport en route from Cumbria to Monaco The Casino at Monte Carlo Wings in line - Aero freedom promised increased downforce and cornering speed Cars left the start ramp in Casino Square on Thursday night Neuville went straight into the lead, just a whisker faster than M-Sport new boy Ogier Evans return to the WRC was giving mixed stage times, mainly due to DMACK perhaps not having the experience of the mighty Michelin empire The Monte is all about tyres Meeke was having an ok start in the much fancied Citroen, but not setting the pace of Neuvile and Ogier Toyota were making a return to WRC, their first official outing since 1999 Ogier was keeping Neuvile very honest, as he adjusted to his new team and car Team mate Tanak grabbed second place when Ogier slid into a ditch Winner of the final 2016 WRC round in Australia Mikkelsen was unable to find a WRC seat for 2017, so he was running a Skoda in WRC2, dominating the class
Neuville continued to lead the field Ogier setting out to claw his way back up the top 10 after his brief off Lefebvre Latvavla Meeke and enthusiastic French spectators... ...but things weren't going well You don't get a view like that in F1
The Citroens never looked totally at ease on the stages, touring car ground clearance was one comment made, strange that Citroen spent more time developing their car than any other team, and ended up with the wrong set up, proving you can't substitute true competition with testing It all ended with a road accident, although to be fair, Meeke was not in a position to challenge for the lead by this point Evans was flying when on the right tyres, even setting fastest stage times, looks like he may be able to challenge for podiums this year Toyota's aggressive aero package Neuville still in front
Romain Dumas is former winner of the 24 Hours of Le Mans, Nürburgring, Spa & Sebring, he has also won the Pikes Peak hillclimb twice, he took a win in the R-GT class in this Porsche 997 GT3 Mark Webber retired from competitive racing at the end of 2016, he now has a job working for Red Bull TV Team Skoda were celebrating 40 years since their first class win
Ogier was applying pressure the best he could, but not quite enough to catch Neuville Neuvile said he knew Ogier would be pushing him hard, so he saw no option but to attack Neuville made contact with the scenery, damaging the rear suspension, and handing the lead to Ogier Tanak was now up to second, could M-Sport take a historic 1-2 finish going into the final day? Long time privateer, Armin Kremer in the Skoda Dani Sordo Incredibly, it was that man again, Ogier came home as winner Tanak had an engine problem, but still managed third overall Latvala gave Toyota second place on their return to the WRC Slightly embarrassing for Citroen was their top finisher Craig Breen, competing in a 2016 car! Final results: 1 Sebastien Ogier - Ford 4h00m03.6s 2 Jari-Matti Latvala - Toyota +2m15.0s 3 Ott Tanak - Ford +2m57.8s 4 Dani Sordo - Hyundai +3m35.8s 5 Craig Breen - Citroen +3m47.8s 6 Elfyn Evans - Ford +6m45.0s 7 Andreas Mikkelsen - Skoda +9m32.7s 8 Jan Kopecky - Skoda +12m58.1s 9 Stephane Lefebvre - Citroen +14m43.8s 10 Bryan Bouffier - Citroen +16m09.4s The first WRC victory for M-Sport since Rally GB 2012
Last weekend saw Round 2 of the 2017 WRC arrive in the County Värmland of Sweden. The only true winter rally of the season, the Swedish allows use of fully studded tryes on all stages Day 1 saw an almighty battle between Latvala in the Toyota... ...and Neuville in the Hyundai, the Belgian had a handy 28 second lead at the end of the first full day Tanak was holding 3rd in the Ford Kris Meeke's Citroen 4th place, meant four different manufacturers in the top 4 at the end of day 1 Hanninen didn't have a good day
The first stage of day 2 caused problems for a different reason, due to some superfast long stretches, Ott Tanak's M-Sport Ford set an average speed of 85.62mph - So what's wrong with that? An FIA rule says the average speed of a special stage must not exceed 80 mph (130 kmh), for the first time since the Group B era, that speed was broken on a special stage, it was more bad planning on the part of the rally organisers, there's no reason why this couldn't have happened say last year. The media are making the most of sensationalising the story, PistonHeads headline from today 'New WRC cars 'too fast' says FIA' - Not true, use of twistier, narrower roads will cure the problem, although to be fair, the FIA did decide they wanted quicker cars?? Mads Østberg was back in the WRC, after missing the Monte Carlo, he was out in a 2017 spec Fiesta WRC Neuville was holding a controlled pace, maintaining his lead Latvala chasing hard It all went wrong for Meeke, he lost over 8 minutes to the leaders Teammate Breen was having his first outing in a 2017 car Monte Carlo winner Ogier was flying! Henning Solberg was having a run in a Skoda Fabia R5! Evans was in the top 10 but had lost a couple of minutes with a puncture Final stage of the day, stage 15 was a super special at Karlstad's trotting track - Neuville had a 31 second lead going into the stage, but he didn't make it out, clipping a front wheel on a tyre bollard, another win had slipped through his fingers
The final day - Latvala started with a slender lead of 3.8 seconds over Tanak. But the Finn held his nerve, setting fastest times on all 3 of the final day's stages, Jari-Matti was on it! Taking a brilliant win Tanak and Ogier took 2nd and 3rd positions, so another good rally for M-Sport Evans took 6th Latvala now leads the championship by 4 points to Ogier Final results 1 Jari-Matti Latvala / M.Anttila Toyota 2h36m03.6s 2 Ott Tanak / M.Jarveoja Ford 29.2s 3 Sebastien Ogier / J.Ingrassia Ford 59.5s 4 Dani Sordo / M.Marti Hyundai 2m11.5s 5 Craig Breen / S.Martin Citroen 2m51.2s 6 Elfyn Evans / D.Barritt Ford 5m26.6s 7 Hayden Paddon / J.Kennard Hyundai 5m31.2s 8 Stephane Lefebvre / G.Moreau Citroen 7m14.7s 9 Pontus Tidemand / J.Andersson Skoda 9m11.1s 10 Teemu Suninen / M.Markkula Ford 10m02.9s
