MOTORSPORT: Dust-up over Rally Australia date

The World Motor Sport Council meeting in Paris on September 30 is expected to make next year's Rally Australia the final event of the season, but triple world champion Sebastien Ogier isn't happy about it.

Nor is the Frenchman's Volkswagen team chief, Jost Capito. Nor the boss of the Ford squad, Malcolm Wilson of M-Sport.

And Australia's new Extreme Rallycross Championship has run into serious difficulties already, forced to cancel next weekend's scheduled round at Melbourne's Calder Park because of insufficient entries while Sydney Motorsport Park management has scuttled the round proposed there for the end of October.

That leaves four rounds on the calendar for the initial season, with the venues for two of them in early 2016 unknown.

CAMS is still considering the expressions of interest to run an official Australian Rallycross Championship, with the possibility of a recommendation to the CAMS board next month.

Rally world champ Ogier wants out of any Sydney celebrations
Sebastien Ogier is a party-pooper when it comes to Rally Australia.

Ogier and his close Volkswagen entourage departed Coffs Harbour promptly last Sunday after clinching his and VW's third straight World Rally Championship titles and he's flagged that he isn't interested in staying around for festivities in Sydney next year if Rally Oz becomes the final round of the WRC.

Primarily Ogier's complaint is that the Coffs Coast roads are not appropriate for deciding the championship – that's if the titles (drivers' and manufacturers') go down to the wire.

As the championship leader last weekend he was first on the road most of the time, which meant he was "sweeping" the gravel stages clean for following competitors.

"Imagine if it was the last round and you go there and play for the championship on that event, on such a rally," Ogier said.

"With such a disadvantage on the starting order, would it be a nice end for the championship? I don't think so.

"If you go there as the leader it would be really unfair.

"We don't have this problem in Great Britain [traditionally the final round, including this season on the second weekend of November].

"The difference between first and second on the road there [Britain] is very small."

Rally Australia is guaranteed to be part of the WRC the next two seasons and organisers have been pushing hard for the event to be the final round – with indications they will get their way.

Trying to revive some of the atmosphere the Adelaide Grand Prix generated when it concluded the Formula 1 World Championship from 1985 to 1995, Rally Oz organisers want to stage an end-of-season party in Sydney on the Monday night after the event.

"We look forward to hearing very soon if our bid to host the season finale next year has been approved," Rally Oz chairman Ben Rainsford said.

"Having the final round would bring significant boosts in tourism attendance and media coverage and allow us to showcase the WRC at a planned gala event in Sydney."
But Ogier has given that the thumbs down.

"The priority No.1 is not the party," he said.

"OK, we must always support the events to promote the rallies, but after that rally I'm not sure people want to stay longer.

"I think they might want to get home."

The Volkswagen team's German boss Jost Capito said: "We already have the FIA [Federation Internationale de l'Automobile] gala [each December] and we have our party ourselves, I'm not sure [a Sydney party is necessary]."

M-Sport's Malcolm Wilson has also dismissed the idea.

"I can tell you now we won't be there," Wilson said.

Meanwhile, WRC manager Michele Mouton has brushed off complaints from drivers about visibility on the Valla night stage during last weekend's Rally Oz.

The top cars ran five minutes apart on the stage because of concerns about the dust in the dark, but drivers still complained about it.

British driver Kris Meeke, who lost his lead in the event to Ogier on that stage, called the situation "a disgrace" and argued with officials at the end of it.

However, Frenchwoman Mouton – a former top driver with Audi, winning four WRC events and finishing runner-up in the 1982 championship, and later a victor at America's famed Pikes Peak hillclimb – said there had been "no safety issue".

"The trouble with these drivers, they don't like uncertainty and the dark brings uncertainty," she said.

"They are not used to competing in the dark, but it is part of the challenge."

Extreme Rallycross lull until at least November
Promoter David Ridden is disappointed at the lack of support from potential competitors for his Extreme Rallycross Championship series that began at Brisbane's Lakeside Park two weeks ago.

Ridden announced two days ago the dropping of the next two rounds, in Melbourne and Sydney, although that announcement hasn't yet been posted on the Extreme website – which is still showing a Calder Park round on September 25-26 and Sydney Motorsport Park on October 30-31.

But the second round is now scheduled for Lakeside Park again on November 13-14, with the third at Adelaide's Wayville Showground on December 11-12.

Two other events remain on the revised calendar in January and February, but without venues.

The first round in Brisbane drew only 16 competitors in three classes – 4WD, 2WD and Excel.

South Australian Steve Glenney won the 4WD class in a Mitsubishi Evo ahead of Colin McRae's brother Alister in the sole Supercar Lite rallycross car in the country, a Ford Fiesta.

Ridden had hoped to start the series with a field of imported $300,000 Supecar Lites.

"We are very disappointed with the level of support we have received from [potential] competitors," Ridden said this week.

"After the success of round one and the positive feedback we have had from all the competitors that competed at Lakeside, there were a lot of drivers and teams telling us they were going to enter round two.

"But that hasn't happened and we cannot run an event [at Melbourne's Calder Park] with only 20 cars."

Ridden was annoyed with Sydney Motorsport Park cancelling the October round, but the venue claimed Ridden had not confirmed the booking.

"We're particularly disappointed with the decision by Glenn Matthews and his board at Sydney Motorsport Park have made, with Glenn [the Australian Racing Drivers' Club chief executive] now telling us with an e-mail that the board of Sydney Motorsport Park have decided they no longer want to be involved in rallycross," Ridden said.

"Our team has spent many hours working with Glenn and his team on track designs and the commercial aspects of running the two events there and to get just an e-mail telling us of their decision after all that work is very unprofessional.

"Over the last few days we have been working closely with our championship partners [primarily tools company Sidchrome] to determine where we go from here.

"With the support from our commercial partner being stronger than ever after round one, they also cannot believe that more competitors haven't supported the Sidchrome Extreme Rallycross Championship to date.

"Rallycross is here and we have proven we can run outstanding events and we are committed to it, but if Australian competitors don't get involved there will be no national rallycross championship in Australia and no commercial support for it.

"We know there are competitors worried about damaging their cars in rallycross. This talk needs to stop as we have rules in place – and rallycross in Australia is not a contact sport."

A combination of rallying and circuit racing, with competition on both dirt and bitumen and with jumps and water splashes, rallycross was popular in Australian in the 1970s, with manufacturer participation and drivers including Peter Brock, Allan Moffat, Larry Perkins and Bob Watson.

The sport is enjoying a new boom overseas, with a World Rallycross Championship in its second year and an American-based Global Rallycross Championship.

Apart from Ridden's venture, Watson tried to revive the sport in Victoria this year but plans for events at the Broadford motorcycle complex north of Melbourne fell through.

However, Greg Evans of the long-established V8Race driving experience embraced Watson's concept of enticing competitors with under-utilised rally cars and lodged one of three expressions of interest to CAMS to stage an Australian Rallycross Championship.

Ridden filed an abbreviation application in that process.

In response to our query about where that process was now at, CAMS general manager of motorsport, Michael Smith, replied: "We are still working through the applications and we expect to have something to our board next month."