Inside Rally

A total of 98 crews are on the entry list for the forthcoming Croatia Rally, round 10 of the 2013 FIA European Rally Championship, which gets underway on Thursday 26 September, in Poreč.

Drivers and co-drivers representing 19 different nationalities from 3 continents are registered, with 69 entries from outside the host country and 29 from Croatia.

Cars from 18 manufacturers will take part in the top line Croatia rally competition, with championship leader Jan Kopecky of the Skoda Motorsport Team topping the drivers’ list, followed by Belgian Pieter Tsjoen. It is worth mentioning the presence of South African Henk Lategan with a SKODA Fabia S2000 and two Australian crews, Adrian Coppin and Molly Taylor, both with Citroen DS3 R3 and also the most famous Croatian drivers, Juraj Šebalj with a Skoda Fabia S2000, Daniel Saskin with the new Ford Fiesta R5 and Niko Pulic.

The 2013 Croatia Rally (September 26/28) is organised by the Croatian Car & Karting Federation and promoted by the Italian Company United Business, will celebrate the 40th anniversary of Croatia Rally.

Follow this link www . rallycroatia . com/entryList.html to see the full entry list.

For UK viewers Round 10 of the WRC, Rally Australia will be broadcast on ITV 4 once again. This time on Wednesday 18th at 8pm. It will be an hour highlights program of all the drama and action from the Coff’s based event. 

You can also watch it on ITV4 +1, an hour after the main broadcast. On ITVPlayer for a week after the show. And it will also be repeated on ITV4 on Saturday morning 9:25am and again an hour later on ITV4 +1.

Once again the WRC was totally dominated by one man named Sebastien. winning 19 of the 22 stages in his Volkswagen Polo R Ogier took the win on Rally Australia by 1min 32.1 seconds to Thierry Neuville.

Photo: D.Darrall

Throughout the weekend it looked like Ogier could take the drivers title. However drama on the final final stage including a puncture for Mikko Hirvonen cost him second place. with Neuville moving up to take 2nd, mathematically putting the title just out of reach for Ogier. However the Frenchman still takes the victory and is set to take the title on his home round in France if all goes well.

“The team told me at the finish line that I had missed the title by one point because Mikko had a problem. I tried my best,” said 29-year-old Ogier, who was congratulated at the end of the stage by his father, mother and sister.  “The most important thing is that we did another perfect rally and we thought it was OK for the title, but it can’t be written down yet. When you do a perfect job like that you expect to get it, but it’s going to happen soon,” warned Ogier, who has three rounds remaining in which to be secure the crown.

Other Drama on the final stage included Puncture for Mikko Hirvonen and Jari Mati Latvala although they both didn’t understand where or what caused the tyres to puncture. Kris Meeke had to retire for the 2nd time on this event with broken suspension. Meeke coming to stage end with his rear right wheel hanging off. Rules now state that cars can’t drive on public roads back to service on only 3 wheels for safety reasons.

Overall Results Rally Australia

1. Ogier wins
2. Neuville +1:32.1
3. Hirvonen +2:02.1
4. Latvala +2:57.4
5. Ostberg +3:17.2
6. Mikkelsen +3:37.6
7. Novikov +7:31.2
8. Quinn +13:10.2
9. AL-Quassimi +15:17.6
10. Al-Kuwari +17:27.7