2012 FIA World Rally Championship

Tough break for Meeke ahead of the Monte
http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/96830

The Mini WRT will run Dani Sordo at all of the WRC's rounds, and fill the second car with a local driver.

Blessed are the Meeke My arse.

A step in the right direction!

http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/96834

Now, let's have Rally GB run properly through Wales, Northern England, Scottish Borders and Central Scotland!

Right, the Monte is back where it belongs. 17-22 January.

So, the runners and riders?

Ford
Latvala (Ford WRT)
P. Solberg (Ford WRT)
Tanak (M-Sport)
Novikov (M-Sport)
Delcour (M-Sport)*
Prokop (Czech Ford National Team)
H. Solberg (Private)
Wilson (Private)

Citroen
Loeb (Citroen WRT)
Hirvonen (Citroen WRT)
Neuville (PH Sport)
van Merksteijn (PH Sport)

Mini
Sordo (Mini WRT)
Campana (Mini WRT)

*Priority 2 driver

Competition begins on Wednesday, with the rally ending in Monaco on the Sunday. The drivers will complete two runs through the famous 15 mile Col de Turini test, between Moulinet and La Bollene Vesubie on Saturday on SS14 and SS16. The longest test of the rally comes on SS1 and SS3 on the Wednesday for the run between Le Moulinon and Antraigues, a 22 mile pass.

The VW World Rally Team will be in force, running two works Skoda Fabia S2000's for Sebastien Ogier and Kevin Abbring. They will be running in the SWRC class as priority 2 drivers. Two more works cars from Proton will be running in the SWRC class for P-G Andersson and Giandomineco Basso. British Rally Championship driver Craig Breen will be competing in his Ford Fiesta S2000 and Armindo Aurujo will be competing in a S2000 variant of the Mini JCW.

I also understand that Eurosport will be showing highlights only, not live coverage as with the IRC in the past few editions of the Monte.

Al-Attayah will be running a third works Citroen at some point in the season. Obviously not for the Monte by the looks of things.

Shocked they gone to 5 days. 30 mins highlights each day starting from Wednesday, its after the Live snooker so could run late and its on at about 22:00 each day

More WRC rallies should be like this. They need to make these events proper endurance events again.

Bring back the Safari, bring back the RAC, bring back San Remo, bring back Corsica!

Agree nicky thats what a rally is. I am going to be wacthing this year

Live WRC Rally Radio - http://www.wrc.com/fanzone/world-rally-radio/

Motors TV Live Updates: http://www.motorstv.com/car/rally/wrc/live/live-monte-carlo-rally-2012-day-1

SS1 1 Loeb 2 Sordo+1.0s 3 Hirvonen+14.9s 4 Latvala+22.2s 5 P. Solberg+34.4s 6 Campana+40.2s 7 Novikov+42.9s 8 Delecour+48.5s 9 Bouffier+52.2s 10 Arzeno+54.3s

SS2 1 Latvala 2 P. Solberg+28.6s 3 Ogier+31.3s 4 Loeb+52.7s 5 Novikov+56.4s 6 Arzeno+1:03.0s 7 Abbring+1:03.3s 8 Sordo+1:05.3s 9 Hirvonen+1:11.3s 10 Andersson+1:14.9s

AFTER SS2 1 Latvala 2 Loeb+30.5s 3 P. Solberg+40.8s 4 Sordo+44.1s 5 Hirvonen+1:04.0s 6 Ogier+1:10.9s 7 Novikov+1:17.1s 8 Arzeno+1:35.7s 9 Delecour+1:49.3s 10 Campana+2:11.0s

Ford 1 and 3 with Loeb splitting the two. Sordo down in fourth. Hirvonen fifth. Sebastien Ogier very fast in his S2000 Skoda!

SS3 commences at 13:21! Quite enjoying World Rally Radio.

36km stage, very little ice around on this pass. SS2 had quite a bit of ice. Air temperatures are around 5 degrees celcius (41 fahrenheit).

Loeb takes the lead as leading Ford driver Jari-Matti Latvala rolls on SS4, he and Jarmo Lehtinen are okay, but have been forced to retire. Thierry Neuville has also stopped on stage. It's unclear if he has went off the road or if it is mechanical.

Latvala was running with a mixture of treads and studs diagonally across the car to deal with the ice and snow on SS4.

Loeb:

"I think we had a lot better luck than Jari-Matti, he had more pressure on him than I did. We had good grip and the balance was good. I drove really hard and I think we will be in the lead tonight."

Petter Solberg:

"It has been a very good day. I am very pleased. I was expecting these conditions, but it is very difficult to make the right tyre choice. It can happen, we lost some time today. Jari-Matti went straight over a bank at the start of the snow area. He was really excited and focused. I am really sorry for him. I will continue pushing and do my best for the team."

Novikov:

"It was very difficult today. The stages were very difficult and this one was very hard to drive. I had fun and everything is good. I think it is difficult forme, because I have never driven on these roads before."

Ogier:

"It has been a very nice day. I think we are fifth overall. It was a difficult day, but I hope I can drive like this on all the rallies."

Full summary of results have yet to be published, but at the moment we know that Sebastian Loeb leads Daniel Sordo, who leads Petter Solberg by one second. All three manufacturers in the top three positions.

SS4 : 1- Loeb 2- Delecour+35.4s ; 3- Sordo +42.3s ; 4- P. Solberg+53.4s ;. 5- Novikov+1:01.3s ; 6- Ogier+1:02.1s ; 7- Tanak+1:10.4s ; 8- Andersson+1:18.2s; 9- H. Solberg+1:19.3s; 10- Abbring+1:28.1s

AFTER SS4 : 1- Loeb 2- Sordo+1:04.2s ; 3- P. Solberg+1:05.2s; 4- Ogier+2:21.1s ; 5- Novikov+2:26.5s ; 6- Hirvonen+2:30.0s ; 7- Delecour+2:49.9s ; 8- Campana+4:09.7s ; 9- Tanak+4:14.0s ; 10- P.G. Andersson+4:33.8s

Sorry, I do believe that SS4 was today's final stage, no the penultimate.

Day 2: Stage - Time - Stage Name - Length

SS5 09:33 Labatie D'Andaure – Lalouvesc 19.00 km
SS6 10:14 St. Bonnet – St. Julien Molhesabate – St. Bonnet 25.22 km
SS7 11:37 Lamastre - Gilhoc - Alboussière 21.66 km
SS8 14:50 Labatie D'Andaure – Lalouvesc 19.00 km
SS9 15:31 St. Bonnet – St. Julien Molhesabate – St. Bonnet 25.22 km
SS1016:54 Lamastre - Gilhoc - Alboussière 21.66 km

Sorry, video embedding is disabled on this, but here is Day 1's TV Highlights package.

Part 1 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LpU3faRRYh8&feature=related
Part 2 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zrz-jMaMHY8&feature=related

after SS7:

Pos Driver Team/Car Time/Gap
1. Sebastien Loeb Citroen 2h08m12.1s
2. Petter Solberg Ford + 1m23.2s
3. Dani Sordo Mini + 1m26.9s
4. Mikko Hirvonen Citroen + 3m00.9s
5. Sebastien Ogier VW Skoda + 3m13.4s
6. Evgeny Novikov M-Sport Ford + 3m16.0s
7. Francois Delecour M-Sport Ford + 4m07.9s
8. Pierre Campana Mini + 5m31.6s
9. Ott Tanak M-Sport Ford + 5m35.8s
10. P-G Andersson Proton + 7m02.7s

nickyf1 wrote:

1:25 - That Mini

If you watch the Eurosport highlights I posted, you will see why it was apparently sliding so much!

Leading positions after SS10:

Pos Driver Team/Car Time/Gap
1. Sebastien Loeb Citroen 2h45m56.9s
2. Dani Sordo Mini + 1m37.2s
3. Petter Solberg Ford + 1m40.9s
4. Mikko Hirvonen Citroen + 3m40.4s
5. Evgeny Novikov M-Sport Ford + 3m51.5s
6. Francois Delecour M-Sport Ford + 5m19.9s
7. Pierre Campana Mini + 6m49.6s
8. Ott Tanak M-Sport Ford + 7m00.6s
9. P-G Andersson Proton + 10m08.9s
10. Kevin Abbring VW Skoda + 10m31.4s

Ogier went off the road in a supposedly ''substantial'' accident. Both he and co-driver Julien Ingrassia were unhurt.

Day 2 of the Monte.

Trois Jours du Rallye Monte-Carlo


Today's stages don't start till later this afternoon as the Rally moves south to Monaco for the final leg of the rally. Two runs through the Col de Turini are the highlight of the day. Sebastien Loeb still leads the way by over two minutes from Dani Sordo. Petter Solberg is around another minute behind, and his podium is starting to look vulnerable as Mikko Hirvonen closes the gap. The rally could go any way remember. To paraphrase Colin McRae, 30 seconds on the Monte is like 1 second anywhere else, you can gain or lose it in a second.

Leading positions after SS13:

Pos Driver Team/Car Time/Gap
1. Sebastien Loeb Citroen 3h31m25.2s
2. Dani Sordo Mini + 2m12.4s
3. Petter Solberg Ford + 3m22.2s
4. Mikko Hirvonen Citroen + 3m43.0s
5. Evgeny Novikov M-Sport Ford + 4m28.2s
6. Francois Delecour M-Sport Ford + 6m39.1s
7. Pierre Campana Mini + 7m45.1s
8. Ott Tanak M-Sport Ford + 8m44.8s
9. P-G Andersson Proton + 13m20.8s
10. Armindo Araujo Araujo Mini + 14m40.7s

I can't embed these. But here is the Eurosport coverage from Day 4. Some fantastic views of the loop centred on Monaco. Great to see WRC cars driving in the dark on the Turini with the fans getting as dangerously close as possible

1/2 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4x0qVJ4KWS8
2/2 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dxl1UsXuTX4

Thanks Nicky, you've made this one of the best threads yet!