Andreas Mikkelsen 2013.

Bear in mind that it's fan-made livery, official team presentation will be at saturday.

Official livery, more pictures at here

that's rather unspectacular...

German

Looks like 2013 will be quite an opened championship. I would bet on Ogier or Hirvonen!

It might not have all the latest body bits etc. Looks more aggressive from behind.



http://www.ultimatecarpage.com ... olkswagen-Polo-R-WRC.html

the paint the lighting sort of hided the fender and bodywork.

If the Dakar rally ever gets threatened in South America, there's always the US and our northern parts

updated it with the July dates... also this is the new logo for ERC.

Service park is set up @ Monte Carlo. Tomorrow is going to be shakedown.





More pictures here

Jean-Louis Schlesser Wins the Rallye Paris-Dakar (called Africa Eco Race officially) again.

http://www.racedepartment.com/ ... russians-take-the-trucks/

I think it is really interesting to see that in two stages, Loeb built such a strong gap at Monte Carlo especially because no one get live timing in the car. That's mean that everyone was racing absolutely flat !

Loeb is definitely an alien but have to say that VW did quite an impressive debut and that Ogier is really in Loeb legacy.

By the way I know this is about 2012 season but this season edit made by Citroën is really awesome and show why rallying is fantastic. That's show as well how Loeb did affect Citroën reputation and how iconic he is for this brand. Quite interesting to compare that with other categories and see how people around the world are enthusiast for rallying.

Although it is in French (english subtitles available), this movie is awesome. Just show how rally is and how ppl around the stages are still passionate about it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s4GqtyErtIc

Quite interesting to see that a lot of people says that Rally is really low in term of business with only 2.5 (Hyundai...) constructor and 5 differents WRC but at the end of the day, there is still 390,000 spectators in French rally which place this event again as the 2nd biggest sports event in France after Le tour de France and right in front of Le Mans (254,000). That enables this county of France to earn 18,7 million euros in one week. Not bad !

Ofc it is Loeb's home but still look at how many people were on the side of the road in Argentina, Portugal, Finland,...

Big in france, dead elsewhere. With Loeb gone there should be more even competition and less dominance which should bring more fans to the sport, but as long as there are No fast Brits the success wil be limited(sounds stupid but true) unless the cars become more badass.

Speaking of spectators...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?f ... &v=xIok5y7vmA8#t=100s

Quote from Mustafur :

Big in france, dead elsewhere. With Loeb gone there should be more even competition and less dominance which should bring more fans to the sport, but as long as there are No fast Brits the success wil be limited(sounds stupid but true) unless the cars become more badass.

Argentina, Portugal and Spain still have a large amount of spectators as well. Though I agree about Loeb, his talent almost killed all the competition but still one thing, he has always had good competitors, thinking of Solberg, Marcus, Sainz, McRae, Burns, Hirvonen, Latvala but he does less mistake than them and probably get the best car.

VW win the first stage they compete in. Very good omen indeed. It seems like Loeb has this one in the bag for the moment though.

Quote from MoMo92i :

Argentina, Portugal and Spain still have a large amount of spectators as well. Though I agree about Loeb, his talent almost killed all the competition but still one thing, he has always had good competitors, thinking of Solberg, Marcus, Sainz, McRae, Burns, Hirvonen, Latvala but he does less mistake than them and probably get the best car.

I honestly doubt he was using the best car the whole time, for instance hes most dominant year 2006, he was only using a privateer car and also missed a few rounds and won with ease.

There is no Question in my mind that he is the best that ever was.

Quote from BlueFlame :

VW win the first stage they compete in. Very good omen indeed. It seems like Loeb has this one in the bag for the moment though.

Besides good drivers, they have all data and experience from Skoda and Seat, and VW has lots of experience building small turbocharged engines. I'm not surprised either.

btw, WRCforeva has SPEEDs (15min) broadcast on youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FpcweqS-wmE

Quote from ACCAkut :

Besides good drivers, they have all data and experience from Skoda and Seat, and VW has lots of experience building small turbocharged engines. I'm not surprised either.

Of course but it's still a new car and a new challenge.

Turini (SS14) results :

Latvala Out
Novikov Out
Hanninen Out

Noice !

24mins for a 24km stage on SS14, somewhat treacherous.

Quote from BlueFlame :

Of course but it's still a new car and a new challenge.

They had 20 000 km kilometrage, which is about 2 WRC full seasons.

Quote from TypeRacing :

They had 20 000 km kilometrage, which is about 2 WRC full seasons.

Yea, well it just shows how dedicated they are.

Quote from BlueFlame :

Of course but it's still a new car and a new challenge.

it is, but there are lots of parts that a basically interchangeable with the proven Skoda Fabia S2000 cars, mostly suspension. The engine seems to be all new.

Just hoping for more works teams now