WRC '17 - Does it have to disappoint? Part 3...

In Part 2 of the 2017 season preview of the World Rally Championship, the new chassis regulations came under scrutiny with emphasis on wilder appearances and greater spectacle as a result of more radical aero devices and wider tracks.
So there's plenty of scope for a huge uplift in positivity about the championship. Isn't there?

The rally format fail

Yes, I know. I may have mentioned these things once before, briefly. But in a season preview, especially one that offers as much 2017 apparently does, you have to cover it all. So read on and mutter under your breath if you must. Or just skip to the "Start Order" section below.

That #@$%&*! Sunday half day

If we accept that the average WRC event should encompass roughly 300kms of competitive stage mileage - around 40% on day #1, 40% on day #2 and a piddly 20% on day #3 - then those precious three hundred kilometres should work as hard as possible, right? I mean, we should expect every single one of those kilometres to count, surely?

Ogier on Condor - credit: magallanesdeportes

So how is it that they don't?

 Because the half day's competitive action on Sunday makes it virtually impossible for any competitor who trails the car ahead by a measly minute on the score sheet on Saturday night, to make up that deficit within the remaining stage distance.

And the fans know it, which diminishes the excitement of the rest of the rally when at the end of Saturday, a large number of the final placings in the event are already known. All because the truncated Sunday format is too short to allow things to turn around.

Is it possible to fit a 3 day event into a live 1 hour TV broadcast?

The current WRC format attempts to do this. It's called the Power Stage and it's actually the final stage of the rally, but with a cherry on top. So what exactly is this "Power Stage"?

It seems that it simply wasn't exciting enough for somebody to drive their butt off for 3 days and win against the odds, so a contrived "joker" element was introduced. This took the form of allocating bonus points, with the fastest driver gaining an additional 3 points for the rally (and thus toward the Driver's Championship), the runner-up getting 2 points and the third-placed driver a single point.

The rationale was that each driver would then be energised enough by the points on offer that he/she would risk it all for that modest reward, then as a result, nobody would cruise home and the results would be in doubt until the final P1 driver had completed the rally. Remember though, that the constuctors don't get any additional points from the Power Stage, which neatly removes any incentive for a team to risk it all on that single stage. Not well thought out chaps.

So how does that create a half-day Sunday?

The timing of the final stage/Power Stage more often than not coincides with a European early afternoon timeslot - the majority of the WRC rallies take place in continental Europe after all - and that makes it possible for the various TV channels carrying the live broadcast to schedule it within their more flexible Sunday afternoon programming.

So the last stage/Power Stage time slot will always dictate that there can't be a full Sunday's rallying as long as the promoter mandates that the organizer of the event fits within that live broadcast window. And having so many events that take place in Europe, the format is now used for all events despite geographic location, presumably to keep continuity across the series.

So to bow to the desire to put the WRC on telly live, we have a format that renders its last day moot.

OK Smartypants, what's your clever answer?

Split the competitive stage distance evenly, within reason, over three days - roughly 100km per day, so that going into the final day there will still be a decent opportunity for somebody to challenge the competitor ahead of them for position and thus encourage them to have a go.

The excitement now comes from a crew chasing another crew for an actual placing on the event, instead of the contrived cherry-on-top bonus point system that has nothing to do with who actually wins the rally. As the event approaches its conclusion on the day, the fans aren't interested in what the drivers championship standings are - they want to see their hero beat the other hero, or at least to enjoy the excitement of seeing them try.

Since it adds nothing to the excitement on the day, let's dump this misbegotten Power Stage and the live TV broadcast altogether. And make the final stage a live stream over the 'net.

The start order moan-fest

As has been the case since rallies were in short pants, some competitor will be advantaged over another by any number of contributing factors, like hanging dust, fog, torrential downpours, nightfall, driving surface condition and perhaps even road position. It's in the nature of the rallying concept, and if you're not happy with that as a driver, you should look for a different sport.

Of course, there are things that could be done to mitigate the advantages and disadvantages that a competitor might be subject to, and at this moment, the rally world is abuzz with claims and counter-claims about how best this may be done. However, if we dealt with them all, this blog post would be longer than the bible so we'll just look at the most discussed topic...

The Peculiar Case of Sébastian Ogier
Cutting to the chase, (not something that comes naturally to me), Sébastian has been complaining about his start order again. He doesn't want to be disadvantaged on the 40% of gravel stage mileage where he sweeps the road surface as first competitor on the road. No, no... he wants somebody else to be disadvantaged instead. Who that should be, he doesn't say, but definitely not Ogier himself. And as the World Champion, I expect that he feels justified in wanting that.

But let's look a little more closely at this 'disadvantaged' business.
What he's whinging about is the fact that he has to drive on loose gravel which negatively impacts both the car's speed and the grip available. A competitor starting in tenth place, for example, has had nine cars cleaning the loose material off the road surface previously, getting a smoother, more grippy layer to drive on, and thus potentially much quicker times - all else being equal. But the guy starting in tenth place is also the tenth-placed driver in the WDC ranking, so does it even matter?

As current leader in the World Drivers Championship, Ogier will start first on the road, the second WDC driver (at the moment Paddon) will be second on the stages, third driver (Ostberg) will run third and so on. Theoretically, at least, the amount of cleaning by a single vehicle will be very little, so relative to the car immediately following him, Ogier is actually disadvantaged very little at all. Same for the third and fourth cars and it's only around the fifth car that there will be a noticeable relative disadvantage.

So, given that his closest championship competitor is right behind him, and getting bugger-all advantage from Ogier's sweeping, what's the Frenchman complaining about? Nothing, that's what. He's acting like a petulant child. Yet I've seen written stories and heard interviews from people who should know better, claiming that Seb is being hard done by with this start order business. And I don't understand their motives. They're not unintelligent people, and they understand the relative effects of sweeping, so their choosing to support the World Champ in his tantrums is peculiar, to say the least.

But it gets more peculiar. The modern WRC has the morning stages repeated in the afternoon, so on the second loop, Ogier's position is first car on what is a swept road and the deep, loose gravel disadvantage has gone - but Ogier has been vocal about the fact that the clear lines that he wants to take advantage of have been obliterated by cars running further down the order.

Uh, hello... that's always been the case in any major rally where there are repeated stages. His rationale seems to be less about fairness, and more about wanting to always enjoy an advantage.

I won't even get into the fact that on tarmac events, as #1 on the road, he gets the advantage of a clean surface, which as he passes, he messes up with water, mud, dirt and gravel from the cuts he makes, deliberately creating poor grip for every car that follows him where it's arguably needed the most.

Strangely, I have never heard him complain about being first on the road on any tarmac events, which currently make up roughly 50% of the WRC calendar. Not once.

Peculiar, eh.

If you happen to have what you believe is a better viewpoint than offered above, feel free to share it in the comments section below.