WRC 2015 season

[MadMatt]

Why should VW be ashamed? It only shows that Citroen is quick and it's a pity Neuville is not driving for them.

Couple for Kubica, nice.

Well, maybe not ashamed, but embarrassed. I mean come on we know the VW is much more superior, and Ogier has been driving full time the past 2 years. Seems now that road conditions have affected the drivers driving further down the order this morning (Loeb) so the gap has been reduced, but still.

Why? Going flat out was a win-win situation for Loeb. If we won, he'd be praised as God.. If he'd crashed, it would be because he was 2 years without rallying. So there was nothing else he could do. I don't think anyone other driver (besides Kubica) would go/had the chance to go on flat-out mode since stage 1 on the first rally of the year.

Probably true, but I don't think the other drivers were holding themselves. No split times, so you HAVE to go as fast as possible. It is so easy to just relax a bit, lose 0.2s/km and end up with a 20seconds deficit at the end of the stage. Stage 1 everybody went flat out, no question.



Kubica's crash on the penultimate stage after the finish line. He had no brakes.

Its another 1-2-3 for VW, Citroën and Hyundai behind, and M-Sport even more behind as predicted.

[MadMatt]

Robert's crash after the finish line of SS14:



A shame, he posted some really good times during this rally, remember he's on Pirelli tyres now, as opposed to Michelin for (most of) the others. I don't exactly know the differences between the compounds tho.

Few more videos from Kubica:













Tanak's off:





Loeb's incident (at 4min):



Nice video with different drivers:



Thanks to the many MANY spectators for these spectacular images!

[JRodrigues]

This IS on the limit

[Scorpaguy]

VW's cash laden outfit sweeps the podium. However, the lack of split times in the cockpits made things interesting. Both Citroen and Ford won stages. Loeb even schooled New Seb on the the first day. I think things might be a bit closer this year.

[MadMatt]

JRRodrigues stop with your fanboy situation. Every driver has its moments during a rally, some more than others, the same as when McRae and Sainz had different styles back then in the Focus, you could visually see the difference.

Championship results after round 1:

1. Sebastien Ogier 25
2. Jari-Matti Latvala 19
3. Andreas Mikkelsen 15
4. Mads Ostberg 12
5. Thierry Neuville 10
6. Dani Sordo 8
7. Elfyn Evans 6
8. Sebastien Loeb 6
9. Kris Meeke 4
10. Martin Prokop 2
11. Ott Tanak 0

Remember some drivers might have the same number of points in a round, this is due to the Power Stage which is the last stage of the rally on Sunday at noon where the 3 fastest drivers are allocated 3, 2, and 1 points respectively.

Next round: Sweden!

[MadMatt]

Another view of Kubica's spectacular off early in the rally:

[iotar__]

So now RK is quick because of Pirellis? Didn't work for Prokop and Berterelli (sp?). I'm kidding of course and it's a bit of unknown but would this argument exist if he was slow? We'll see later but he was quick last year on Michelins. Since it's the only interesting part of the rally along with Loeb's moments: 1. Looks on the limit to me

Off after the stage

Not a connoisseur but WRC season is finished before it started. Hyundai slow and the rest not good enough, Citroen/Fiesta drivers either not quick or not reliable in similar pairs, Ogier cruising, Mikkelsen slowish, Latvala apologising for being too fast and they still end up top three comfortably.

[JRodrigues]

JRRodrigues stop with your fanboy situation. Every driver has its moments during a rally, some more than others, the same as when McRae and Sainz had different styles back then in the Focus, you could visually see the difference.

Championship results after round 1:

1. Sebastien Ogier 25
2. Jari-Matti Latvala 19
3. Andreas Mikkelsen 15
4. Mads Ostberg 12
5. Thierry Neuville 10
6. Dani Sordo 8
7. Elfyn Evans 6
8. Sebastien Loeb 6
9. Kris Meeke 4
10. Martin Prokop 2
11. Ott Tanak 0

Remember some drivers might have the same number of points in a round, this is due to the Power Stage which is the last stage of the rally on Sunday at noon where the 3 fastest drivers are allocated 3, 2, and 1 points respectively.

Next round: Sweden!

Yes, there's 'fanboyism' in this thread. And do, it's not from me. You better take a look at yourself first before you accuse others.

[MadMatt]

Another one with your favorite driver:



Mental.

[iotar__]

My favourite driver is Tommy Makkinen. I follow it but I'm not overly excited about Kubica's best or worst moments in WRC. Probably less excited than people who don't support him. Good thing is we saw brake failure moment from every possible angle =D> , it wasn't that dramatic.

If you want to talk about tyres you cannot not talk about privateer vs manufacturers, completely new small team, Fiesta's pace on tarmac vs Citroen or VW (Prokop/Tanak/Evans as the nearest comparison), budgets, quality and experience of staff, engines, aero, gearboxes, hands, hand-brakes, seasons in rallying, seasons in WRC etc. When it was Loeb winning stages by 30 s it was his genius when it's Kubica it's all Pirellis . Only one specific rally anyway.

edit: how convenient, if anyone's interested in Kubica's team and how tough it is , Fiesta a new car for most of them, 2015 spec car for Portugal etc. (pl to googlish but understandable) https://translate.google.com/translate? ... 1,352.html

[MadMatt]

For sure these discussions about teams have been there forever (check old WRC posts on this forum). I always said, and will repeat it, that VW has the biggest $$$. They destroyed Dakar, then got bored, and transferred everything to WRC, and won again. Audi (how surprising, from the same VAG group) did the same at LeMans for 10 years!

It is not always about the money (ask Toyota F1 back in their debuts), but come on, you have to see their facilities, it is just another level. Hyundai is building the same sort of infrastructure, but they've got no experience, and not so many engineers that know how to win.

If you read Kubica's thread here, you'll see that I have always been unsure about his rally career choice, but on the other hand I had strong links with him! You say Loeb was all his genius when he won that stage, I agree, but it was also helped by road condition when the first runners swept the fresh snow out of the racing line. That's no surprise Tanak also scored a good time and he was just before of Loeb in running order. That doesn't remove what Loeb did, but just put things in perspective when you say Kubica's scratch times were all due to the Pirellis.

Do you know how little experience Pirelli has in the WRC compared to Michelin (and BF which was also Michelin)? How do you explain that despite that they managed to produce what you seem to say "a magic tyre" while Michelin cannot? Strange. Prokop on Pirellis was not up front as well so...

Kubica is very fast, but he has the McRae spirit, flat out no matter what, and you cannot drive a whole rally like this. This season will be the first one where he's got pace notes for all rallies in a WRC car so the disadvantage he had last year should be reduced. Like Prokop got pretty much all the latest mechanical evolutions from M-Sport for the Fiesta because he's been with them for so long, Kubica got them as well (probably thanks to Lotos). When you look at the 2015 car you see that the front bumper/face is different, and the splitter at the bottom is gone, so you will lose front downforce, therefore, no rush moving to the 2015 evolution!

[nacho]

Loeb's off was a pity, such a small mistake in those conditions. Anyways his performance was pretty damn good.

[Scorpaguy]

The biggest surprise for me at Monte was how well MSport faired as compared to Hyundai. I've had the pleasure to visit all the pits up close for the last 3 years. Hyundai has top notch facilities and great drivers...and they were outpaced for much of the event by the MSport guys.

As for Loeb...I sure would have liked to see he and Seb2 fight it out when Citroen were spending lots of Money (2008-13).

VW...they sweep the floors with 20 Euro notes and stud their tires with 2 Euro coins.

I'd really like to see spec shocks and transmissions/transfer cases for the teams. That would really even things up a bit.

[MadMatt]

Yes it was a bit surprising how bad Hyundai performed, but let them some time.

Even if you give the team the same suspension/transmission, the team with most money will still win because they will test every possible suspension setting, build complicated suspension model and stage simulator to predict the best damper clicks, and so on, so it is hopeless. When I was working in a WRC team, that team had not even tested its dampers on a dyno to see what was the range of adjustment! You can guess that this team wasn't VW...

[Cold Fussion]

Has anyone signed up to wrc plus?