Exploring the Thrills and Triumphs of Motorsport


August 8, 2023
Spotlight
Editorial


Rallying isn’t the most accessible form of auto racing to understand and enjoy. This guide will help you determine what’s happening and what to look for. While race vehicles battle head-to-head against one another on the track, rally cars face off against a stopwatch in the “real” competition. It makes a huge difference for anyone who wants to watch and understand the sport. The winner is the first car to cross the finish line in a race. Just by standing alongside the track, you can see what’s happening. The race is led by the car in front, and the cars behind are behind.

What Is a Rally?

What is rally car racing? Rally racing is one of the oldest and most pure types of motorsports. Instead of being held on race tracks, it occurs on public or private roads. It’s different from NASCAR and Formula 1 because cars race from one place to another instead of around a track. Even though some types of motorsport might have faster and more powerful cars, many still see the rallying world as the best kind because it is unpredictable and hard on both the rally car and the rally racing driver.

Autocross is a great way to try it out for people who have never done professional racing. The goal is to beat the clock on a short track, typically between 800 and 1200 meters long, and set in a grass or wheat field.

How a Race and a Rally Racing Differ

In a race, contestants are vying to be the first to cross the finish line, but in a rally, the emphasis is on speed at the expense of distraction and detour. Most of the time, racing people do so on closed tracks that have been carefully made to keep other people out. On the other hand, Rally racing drivers need help from co drivers to get around on public or private roads. These co drivers help with the turning wheel and brakes when needed.

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Types of Rallies

Road and stage rallies are the two main types of rally races. From the 1960s till date, stage rallies have been the legal form of the sport. On the other hand, road rallies are considered the sport’s first form.

Stage Rallies

 

The World Rally Championship (WRC) rally crews prefer stage races, in which the rally racing driver and co-driver try to finish special stages on closed public roads as quickly as possible. Most rallies have between 15 and 30 special stages; the winner is the driver whose total time is the lowest. The ground on these stages can be grass, snow, or paved roads.
Road Rallies

 

Road parades were the first type of sport, and they are still done on public roads. Regarding road races, it’s not about how fast you can go on your rally car but how well you can keep track of time and how fast you go on average.
Super Special Stages

 

These stages are competitions where two rally cars compete against one another on parallel routes that resemble a typical circuit. These tracks typically travel relatively little distance. The person whose special and super stage times total up to the least wins, just like with ordinary stages.
Pacenotes and Reconnaissance

 

Before a race starts, the driver and co driver can check out the stage to better understand what to expect. Then, both drivers write down “pace notes” that describe the rally stage in-depth and show where turns, jumps, dangers, and sharp corners are.

Other Types of Rallies

Even though this list is incomplete, other types are worth mentioning.

  • Off-road/cross-country: These races occur in off-road areas and require specially modified rally cars, trucks, motorcycles, and buggies. Desert races are part of this subtype. The Mojave Off-Road Racing Enthusiast series is a well-known desert race.
  • Endurance: Endurance events, often mixed with off-road or cross-country racing, test the strength of the cars and the strength of the people who take part. Considerable lengths are travelled, and in well-known races like the Dakar Rally (which used to be called the Paris-Dakar Rally), this takes place over many days and several thousand miles under challenging conditions.

Rally

Rallying is different from rallying. It doesn’t matter if you are first, second, or last to cross the finish line. The important thing is to do it as quickly as possible. Rally cars for racing only leave at a time. Since the race tracks aren’t made for passing, the cars leave at set times, normally 1 to 3 minutes apart. Still, this is easy to understand. The winner will be the rally car that goes from the start of the stage to the end of it the fastest.

The general results for the whole race are where things get more complex. The race goes to the driver who gets the most stages. Most of the time, this is true, but only sometimes. In a rally, the best time on all of the special rounds together is what counts. This can be confusing when a driver wins a lot of stages but falls way down in the results because he lost a lot of time in just one of them.

Penalties like being late for the start of a stage, breaking the rules, not finishing a stage, and so on can also change the results.

Classes of Rally Racing Cars

The WRC and FIA have strict rules about which cars can race. The FIA classifies a standard rally racing car as factory, touring, or grand touring type, and the rally car needs to be homologated to be able to race. The best cars are in the WRC1 class, while the WRC5 class is where people start in the WRC.

  • World Rally Cars with 1.6-litre engines are the fastest on the WRC. The cars in this class can’t have more than 360 horsepower, including the Toyota Yaris WRC, the Ford Fiesta WRC, and the Hyundai i20 Coupe WRC.
  • Rally Pyramid Cars: This category is divided into six groups; five of these made the WRC. Rally3 vehicles will be used in WRC3 beginning in 2022, Rally4 cars won’t be used in the WRC competition by 2022, and Rally2 cars are in the RC2 class. WRC support is not available for vehicles formerly known as R2 or Group R.
  • Historically Eligible Cars: In the past, cars were put into four groups: Group 1 was for series production touring cars, Group 2 was for touring cars, Group 3 was for production grand touring cars, and Group 4 was for upgraded grand touring cars. These groups were changed in 1982. The first group became Group N, the second group became Group A, and the fourth group became Group B. In 1987, Group A gave the fastest class back to Group N. Under the current WRC2, Group N cars could run until 2016. In 2011, the WRC limited engine sizes to 1.6 litres. This made it impossible for many standard rally racing classes to compete.

Conclusion

Rally racing sports are still prevalent all over the world. There are pro rally events and teams in the US, but they are less busy than in Europe. Rally sports cars are made to handle unusual surfaces like ice, asphalt, and dirt that can be found on rally racing tracks all over the world. The World Rally Championship is the biggest race in the sport.

Drivers fight in rally racing cars that can be driven on the street worldwide. Rallying is excellent motorsport at the grass-roots level; anybody with the proper safety gear may join a rally racing championship immediately.