Rally GB – AUSmotive.com

Rally Australia fighting for last place

Rally Australia organisers are planning to bump Rally GB from the last event on the WRC calendar from 2016 onwards. The 2015 calendar has Rally Australia in the same September slot as this year, with Rally GB in its traditional finale position.

However, Rally Australia boss Ben Rainsford, who is negotiating with the FIA to secure the event until 2018, reckons a warm Aussie summer would make the perfect send off for the WRC year.

“We’re pretty open about wanting to be the last event in the championship and we’ll push hard for it, very hard,” Rainsford said. “We’re looking at putting on a gala dinner, an end-of-season party in Sydney. The city’s ripe for it and Sydney’s good at that kind of thing.

“An Australian summer is a very good place to be, especially when you’re in a European winter. We’ve run as the final round in Perth a few times and it was very popular.”

Rally GB has hosted the final event of the WRC season 33 times since the series began in 1973 and organisers are keen to maintain that spot.

“Rally GB has always presented a unique and demanding challenge to the teams and a fitting climax to the championship,” said Ben Taylor, Rally GB managing director. “Over the years it has thrown up some thrilling finishes and it makes sense for the key WRC markets for those to be played out in a European time zone.

“We certainly don’t presume the right to hold the final event, but Wales Rally GB is on an upward curve and we are committed to working with our partners, the FIA and the promoter to deliver the best possible rally with which to end the next two seasons and beyond.”

[Source: Autosport]

Okay, we know this update is a week late, but you pay peanuts, you get monkeys!

So, last weekend Sebastien Ogier did what he does best and that’s dominating his teammates and opponents on the way to another WRC victory, this time at the season-ending Wales Rally GB.

Like the Seabstian in Formula 1, Ogier has done enough by himself to wrap up the manufacturers’ championship for his employer. Although Volkswagen certainly didn’t complain to see Jari-Matti Latvala pick up second place in Wales, providing the team with a perfectly suitable close to a year they would not have even dared to dream when they rocked up to Monte Carlo in January.

Equally fitting was seeing Thierry Neuville on the podium. In just his second year in the WRC he placed second overall in the drivers’ title. He’ll be hoping to emulate Volkswagen’s success in 2014 when he leads the charge for Hyundai’s re-introduction into rallying’s premier category.

And the less said about CitroÃ«n’s race in Wales and the season overall the better. They had a terrible year and may well choose to sulk off into the distance with the security of Sebastien Loeb’s WTCC campaign to console them.

The WRC now enters its dormant stage. Although, with just over 50 days until the teams re-emerge for the 2014 season there won’t be much time for reflection for Ogier and Volkswagen, who will no doubt be hoping to embarrass the competition again next year. Thankfully, Neuville, at the very least, will have other ideas.