Brave New World Rally Championship

It was hard to take it all in. After dissecting the words of the FIA World Motor Sport Council press release on Wednesday, it turns out that they announced a staggering 17 changes to be introduced into the World Rally Championship.

Each one is significant in its own right, and if they had been drip-fed independently they all would have generated a separate news story on autosport.com. Instead, as a combination of changes, it landed with overwhelming force.

The package means that the 2007 World Rally Championship is going to be drastically different, and unlike any season ever seen before.

That's not hyperbole. How else can you describe a points system that means a driver who finishes fourth could take home more points than the rally winner?

How else can you describe a points system where a driver who has retired can score the same amount of points as the podium finisher? How else can describe a set of rules that bans instant puncture repair mousse yet also outlaws a driver from limping back to service on three 'wheels'?

The definition of wheels is, of course, to be determined, but the removal of that aid together with the abolishment of the Super Rally rules will shake up the known order. But make no bones about it, there will be many people happy that the emphasis of the WRC is back on endurance.

With manufacturers dropping like flies and interest in the series flagging by its own standards, the World Rally Championship Commission should be applauded for taking steps to revitalise the series.

Sporting changes

• Super Rally regulations abolished
• Bonus points for each individual leg (1st - 3; 2nd - 2; 3rd - 1), up to 19 points available per rally
• Manufacturer 1 drivers only allowed to test for their own manufacturer
• Total test days to be reduced
• Drivers in Super 2000 cars can earn drivers' championship points.

These are the most significant. Super Rally is gone after two seasons, and the rally purist rejoices. It made a mockery of the spirit of rallying and now the winner will be just that - the driver that has fought through all the adversity but competed every single stage mile.

To have drivers like Sebastien Loeb finish second on this year's Monte Carlo Rally, despite crashing out on the opening leg, caused widespread and justified criticism.

Sebastien Loeb crashes out of the Rally Monte Carlo © Gauloises

The aim of Super Rally was to keep as many cars in the event for as long as possible, allowing promoters to have maximum chance of being able to give their spectators a bunch of quality rally cars to watch on the rally's latter stages.

The bonus points system that will replace it, will be seen by those purists as a bad move. But it could prove a master stroke for two reasons: there will always be something to fight for on each day, and the championship should be closer as a result.

Very few rallies recently have been decided on the final day, and now, spectators will be able to watch on Sunday knowing that everyone will not be just going through the motions - there will be those fighting for those something extra.

With a possible runaway event leader eligible for those points as well, and as a result having to push harder when they would rather be coasting against those with nothing to lose, Sunday is going to be a whole lot more fun.

With more points on offer and different ways of scoring them, the championship could be more open than in previous years. Then again, more points available gives Sebastien Loeb even more of an opportunity to build up his seemingly customary early championship lead...

The system does leave the door open for criticism that drivers could earn more points through the bonuses than those who actually finish the event, even for those who finish on the podium.

For example, if a driver is fastest on the first two days he will earn six points from bonuses with a rally win seemingly in the bag. Imagine he then hits trouble on the final leg and struggles home. He will still take home 11 points for fourth - one more than the winner who has carefully driven consistently over the whole distance, faster than anyone else.

It's a slightly complicated system for the casual fan, but it could go some way to giving the championship more depth and make it more exciting.

The other sporting changes, such as testing restrictions, are sensible at first glance. It appears from the FIA wording that drivers will now no longer be able to test for a rival in a given season.

Surely that is already happening? Maybe, but this move probably outlaws what Sebastien Loeb has done this season - developing the C4 in private for Citroen, while competing for Kronos Racing in public.

Super 2000 cars are being welcomed, and drivers can earn championship points if competing in them, potentially staving off the threat from the new Super 2000-based IRC - the International Rally Championship.

Calendar changes

• Second snow rally, in Norway
• Brand new event in Ireland
• Resurrection of the Rally of Portugal
• Possible additional rounds to the announced 16
• Plans to make WRC a 'winter' championship, from summer through to the following spring, delayed

The calendar changes will also give the WRC a very different feel next year. An additional snow event in Norway, twinned with Sweden, makes perfect sense to spread out the cost of development of cars purely for the most wintery of conditions.

Thomas Radstrom and Jorgen Skallman, Subaru; Rally Sweden © LAT

Ireland makes a welcome appearance on the international motorsport map, and the return of Portugal, for the first time since 2001, again pleases the traditionalists.

Yet, there is the bizarre possibility, despite many of the changes seemingly being introduced under the conditions of cost saving, that the championship could extend beyond 16 events.

The World Rally Championship Commission is to look whether it wants to save the ousted events in Cyprus, Turkey or Australia as well as considering implementing the other candidate events in Poland, Jordan and South Africa. If the competitors can afford it, then more rallies is naturally a good thing.

But the most interesting aspect of the new schedule is the abandonment of the idea that the WRC should be a winter series. This is a shame.

A summer break was introduced into this year's schedule as the first step to a switch to an annual series that ran from summer to the spring of the following year. It was thought that the 2007 championship would have just eight or nine rounds, before a full 2007/08 season started in August of '07.

Next year's schedule will retain the summer break but will run over a traditional year, from January to December, from Monte Carlo through to the Rally GB.

Such a move would have been good to differentiate it further from the Formula One year (the FIA ensured some years ago that rallies and Grands Prix no longer clash), with the season build-up and climax being at different parts of the year.

Hopefully with the 2007 calendar retaining the two-month summer-break, the potential for the championship to become a winter series still exists.

Technical changes

• Number of engines per season will be limited
• One specification of engine per year
• Remote servicing to return
• Only one tyre manufacturer from 2008
• Anti-deflation mousse in tyres to be outlawed from 2008
• Cars no-longer allowed to limp back to service on less than four wheels
• Biofuel to be introduced in the long term

Another move that will satisfy the purists - and potentially keep more cars in the event - is the possibility of remote servicing in the future.

Rallies moved to a single spectator-friendly service park in the late nineties, which had had the knock-on effect of restricting routes. With possibility of work being carried out to the cars outside of base, there is a greater likelihood that cars will get through increased miles, and routes can be extended and more stage miles utilised.

OMV-Peugeot service area © OMV/Peugeot

But what won't help the cause of keeping cars in the event, and could make the changes controversial, is the banning of anti-deflation mousse.

Currently, the latest specification tyres have a mousse that is automatically squirted inside when a tyre suffers a puncture, limiting the effects and effectively keeping the tyre inflated.

The driver feels an annoying vibration in the car when this happens, but it is nowhere near as debilitating as having a flat.

The chances of getting a flat will be in part negated by the Formula One-style switch to a single tyre manufacturer, which means that without a rival, harder compounds that are more resistant to punctures can be mandated. However, there is no getting away from the fact that this sport involves driving quickly on gravelly, dusty roads, and tyres are still made of rubber. Some punctures are inevitable.

But then a car is not allowed to drive road sections on three wheels, and scenes of Sebastien Loeb being escorted by the police back to service, as in Mexico 2005, will be gone. Knock a corner off the car, and it's instant retirement for you, mate.

There is common sense to this, because it cannot be safe to drive several miles on a car not built to drive like a Reliant Robin. Yet, the regulations will have to be carefully written to avoid ambiguity.

The FIA announcement from the World Council meeting stated that drivers would not be allowed to drive on less than four 'wheels' but made no mention of tyres. Will drivers be allowed to drive back home with a puncture, the ones they only have because the FIA banned that lovely anti-deflation mousse?

The number of engines used will be further limited to save costs, and development on them during the season will be outlawed.

Finally, the FIA will investigate the introduction of Biofuels. In theory, fuels derived from crops are more environmentally friendly than fossil fuel equivalents, but this is also potential for some good PR for the championship. After all, Le Mans organisers did themselves no harm at all this year by introducing rules that favoured diesel cars.

So what do all these measures mean? A closer, more exciting, more action-packed World Rally Championship?

We can only hope. What the WRC is really lacking at the moment is not necessarily top-drawer manufacturers, but quality drivers competing in every round and fighting for the title. If these measures go some way to redressing that balance, then brilliant.

Rallying needs an overhaul like this to give it a shot in the arm - although perhaps thankfully it did stop short of changing the very fabric of the competition, as the mooted event-deciding play-off Super Specials would have done.

The devil will be in the detail, and all these measures came with the caveat that the finer points will be determined by the World Rally Commission in the coming months.

So please organisers, get this right. Here's to the future and a credible sport.