WRC Sweden---and Swedish Championship---especially Grupp H

But what I see from that chart is 2wd cars going comparable to the fastest WRC guys. 6th fastest stage time says a lot.

Why the argument that's BS.

we need any positive motivation we can get.
Its impressive who ever you are.

volvo test clip




"RWD Revolution" with some added fist pumping!!

Matt Wilson is really running out of time to "get" rally driving. How much more seat time does he need?

Problem is that you have to know what you are looking at and John only presented part of the picture.

SS2 Vargasen 1 (24.63km)
1. 6 M. ØSTBERG 14:41.9 0.0 0.0
2. 3 M. HIRVONEN 14:42.9 +1.0 +1.0
3. 4 J. LATVALA 14:57.2 +14.3 +15.3
4. 11 P. SOLBERG 15:00.0 +2.8 +18.1
5. 2 S. OGIER 15:18.1 +18.1 +36.2
6. 18 P. SANDELL 15:19.6 +1.5 +37.7
7. 1 S. LOEB 15:24.5 +4.9 +42.6
8. 5 H. SOLBERG 15:24.6 +0.1 +42.7
9. 20 E. BRYNILDSEN 15:26.0 +1.4 +44.1
10. 19 M. PROKOP 15:32.9 +6.9 +51.0

13. 8 K. RÄIKKONEN 15:47.6 +2.6 +1:05.7
17. 43 K. BLOCK 16:20.4 +15.6 +1:38.5
18. 15 M. WILSON 16:26.6 +6.2 +1:44.7

Pos No Dc Driver/CO-Driver Club Make SS 2
1 146 Martin Berglund VW 16:16,9
2 147 Peter Zachrisson Volvo 16:09,9
3 145 Tobias Söderqvist Toyota 16:42,4

I'll Note that Berglund was 24th in the SM Rally Sweden overall results on that stage with a WRC Escort - not exactly cutting edge - winning the stage with a 14:54.2... good enough for third overall. I think that makes it clear that the road was MUCH faster/predictable for the back of the pack than it was the front.

On Stage 5, where road conditions for the front of the pack would be similar to the first pass for the back of the pack ... everyone dropped significant time. Block dropped a minute on the 24k stage... a 4sec/k advantage.

Of course the 'local championship' entries didn't do a second pass of the stages so we can't really see a clean comparison.

here are the SM Rally Sweden results for those that want to look:
http://193.12.114.105/rally/resultat/tavling.jsp;jsessionid=B3E04A6313BA4088B884FA0184F95A16?tavling=456

Of course comparing people with well developed cars that they have driven and developed in these very conditions to someone who only got their first drive on WRC studs this week and has only driven the new WRC car this week as well is also a bit loaded.

(I was composing when the above was posted)

Most of the 2wd stages look like they were run after being laden with virgin snow and swept clean by all the preceding WRC cars. Stage 9 was the second running of stage 3 and so you can compare WRC and 2wd both starting with a swept surface for a better apples to apples comparison. The top WRC cars are all a lot faster. Id rather be watching the Volvo however

http://www.rally-maps.com/map/Rally-Norway/stage/218/Kirken%C3%A6r

2wd stage 9 (second listed time)
http://193.12.114.105/rally/resultat/resultat.jsp?tavling=456&urval=granskad.deltar.tavlingsklass12695&rubrik=Klassresultat&underrubrik=Trimmat%202WD



WRC stage 9
http://wrc.com/results/2011/rally-sweden/stage-times/?category=wrc&stageno=9





Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 02/12/2011 12:45PM by RallyTaco.

interesting comments from WRC.com

Quote
WRC.com
...
“Maybe I don’t have a chance but you never know,” said Hirvonen. “All I can do is go flat-out. It’s been so difficult today because all those drivers running after us on the national rally are making the line in completely the wrong place but they won’t be there tomorrow so maybe we can do it. I will just push as hard as I can.”
Ostberg started day two 14.8s up on Hirvonen but gradually slipped back as the day progressed.
“It’s been absolutely very difficult today,” said the M-Sport Stobart Fiesta driver. “I expected it to be a lot better on the second pass of the stages but it was a lot worse with all the ruts that had formed. That made it so frustrating but that’s how it is. I just have to stay calm and not do anything stupid, drive and push again.”

So we see the WRC cars actually gained massive time on their second running of the stages despite the roads being filled with ruts on the 'wrong' lines making the roads worse in some ways but still faster without the deep snow.

Quote
RallyTaco
Stage 9 was the second running of stage 3...

Don't think it was actually

Quote
Morison
interesting comments from WRC.com

Quote
WRC.com
...
“Maybe I don’t have a chance but you never know,” said Hirvonen. “All I can do is go flat-out. It’s been so difficult today because all those drivers running after us on the national rally are making the line in completely the wrong place but they won’t be there tomorrow so maybe we can do it. I will just push as hard as I can.”
Ostberg started day two 14.8s up on Hirvonen but gradually slipped back as the day progressed.
“It’s been absolutely very difficult today,” said the M-Sport Stobart Fiesta driver. “I expected it to be a lot better on the second pass of the stages but it was a lot worse with all the ruts that had formed. That made it so frustrating but that’s how it is. I just have to stay calm and not do anything stupid, drive and push again.”

So we see the WRC cars actually gained massive time on their second running of the stages despite the roads being filled with ruts on the 'wrong' lines making the roads worse in some ways but still faster without the deep snow.

The WRC cars were faster second time thru----and the national cars weren't?

Whatever the case is Morison, the simple point you purposely missed is that cars of the level that a lot of guys could build (sotto voce---if they weren't pissing 4 to 10 times as much money away on "other stuff" is that well built but simpler older 2wd cars can be driven --by good drivers---at similar speeds to the much vaunted "pointy end of the schtick"---if they build 'em, stick with them, and get some skills built up.


Why do you have to try and argue that simple point?

SS2 and SS9
SS3 and SS10
SS4 and SS11
SS8 and SS16
were the same.

Quote
john vanlandingham
The WRC cars were faster second time thru----and the national cars weren't?

From what I see the National cars didn't run the second pass, they certainly aren't shown in the results. The only point I was making was that the first pas was horribly slowed by sweeping the road while the second pass was vastly faster despite 'off line' ruts left by the National guys.

Quote

Whatever the case is Morison, the simple point you purposely missed is that well built but simpler older 2wd cars can be driven --by good drivers---at similar speeds to the much vaunted "pointy end of the schtick"---if they build 'em, stick with them, and get some skills built up.

I didn't miss the point you were trying to make and I don't even disagree with it fundamentally. The problem is that the event you are pointing to does not even remotely support your claim. The 'National' cars have a SIGNIFICANT road condition advantage on these stages which is the only reason the times are close to the WRC times.

Quote

Why do you have to try and argue that simple point?

Mainly because it is the driver, in those cases, not the car that makes them as fast as the 'pointy end.' Beyond that it's absurd to suggest that any car is faster than any given driver. (jvl says "I have said many times that the Swedish GpH and Finnish F-Cup cars, both which require normal aspirated, are very fast, indeed much faster than the fastest North American drivers. "
We've seen the Sprongles decimate most of a national field in a completely stock Suzuki Swift. I competed in a PGT WRX that ran away from most of the open class cars in most events we entered (and were beaten by the Sprongles in the Swift on ice and snow.)
No matter what car you have around you if you don't know how to keep it moving and keep it on the road you'll be slow. Good drivers can be fast in anything. Poor drivers need performance parts to make them moderately quick but they'll never be truly fast. In simpler terms ... it's not the car that makes a driver fast.

We need an ignore person from here option on this forum. Make some rules like, ignore future posts if John and Keith and Timm if John plus one of the two others post in the same thread.

I got the point. It wasn't talking shit on the WRC drivers but to point out the potential.

We watched a few minutes of an English language review video of the Finnish Group F championship the other day. It was awesome. Very reminiscent of what we've been trying to do. At one point Mark said, "This is exactly like the videos we've been making except they are all driving at 100%!"

Maybe Mark will post the torrent so people can watch it themselves. It's 188 MB or so.

Quote
NoCoast

We watched a few minutes of an English language review video of the Finnish Group F championship the other day. It was awesome. Very reminiscent of what we've been trying to do. At one point Mark said, "This is exactly like the videos we've been making except they are all driving at 100%!"

Maybe Mark will post the torrent so people can watch it themselves. It's 188 MB or so.

A link and or torrent and a way to find any older past such reviews would be awesome. I'll bump it to the top of my seed list and leave it there if one gets made.

TLDR

Quote
NoCoast
I got the point. It wasn't talking shit on the WRC drivers but to point out the potential.

But Grant, the thing is that John only hurts the image of the cars when he resorts to blatant misrepresentation of the car's potential to make them look good.

Statements like "So, build those damn cars boys and you too can beat Block, even if he's in a works car... " are simply laughable, not even close to reality and are one of the reasons most of the people I know [ie: everyone I talk to] don't take John seriously.

The stupid thing is that I think we all agree that a simple, solid 2wd (RWD) platform makes the most sense for the 'clubman' ralliest. Setting unrealistic expectations for the platform doesn't help that cause which, ultimately, doesn't help the market for John's business.

Quote
Morison

Quote
NoCoast
I got the point. It wasn't talking shit on the WRC drivers but to point out the potential.

But Grant, the thing is that John only hurts the image of the cars when he resorts to blatant misrepresentation of the car's potential to make them look good.

Statements like "So, build those damn cars boys and you too can beat Block, even if he's in a works car... " are simply laughable, not even close to reality and are one of the reasons most of the people I know [ie: everyone I talk to] don't take John seriously.

The stupid thing is that I think we all agree that a simple, solid 2wd (RWD) platform makes the most sense for the 'clubman' ralliest. Setting unrealistic expectations for the platform doesn't help that cause which, ultimately, doesn't help the market for John's business.

All right Mr Know-it-all compare and contrast--if you actually know any details---of what makes the platform of those guys there who were making pretty gawddam respectable times, all your armchair hating on them notwithstanding,

but what is it that makes their platforms "realistic' and the same or virtually identical platforms here "unrealistic"...

Because despite your normal hyper-nit-picking and cluck-clucking,

the times set by quite a number of the guys, both 2wd and 4wd, in the National were pretty good---when measured against (searching for a word which won't be pointlessly seized on in a obsessive attempt to discredit---rather than see the point) supposedly the best cars money can buy...


So hows a Golf or a 940 Volvo a realistic platform there, and an unrealistic platform here?