Everything about WRC special stages
From 2010 to 2013 the routes of Rally Finland changed drastically. The competitive lengths became shorter, but the road sections sometimes longer. Some of the days were driven further South than in years, bringing back stages from the past. Visits to service park became sparser. In addition, one distinct thing for all these four rallies […]
Read More Rally Finland Route History VI: 2010-2013Rallye Monte Carlo runs under the flag of Monaco but all the stages are driven in France. Similarly the center of the rally is in the French city of Gap although the start and Finish are in Monaco. The rally offers again a unique blend of tarmac, ice and snow on mostly narrow roads in […]
Read More Route Preview: Rallye Monte Carlo 2020From 2002 onwards Rally Finland has had only one service park in Paviljonki. Essentially this created the format of WRC events as we know them today. The routes remained quite similar during these years with new stages becoming rare. The era of very long stages also ends here. Cover photo by Vas Foto [CC BY-SA […]
Read More Rally Finland Route History V: 2002-2009This post tells about the time when WRC cars were first introduced and 1000 Lakes Rally became Rally Finland. First the route was tightened through new rules which introduced service parks. At the same time, stages started to be repeated again, on a larger scale than before. Subsequently the overall length was also limited by […]
Read More Rally Finland Route History IV: 1996-2001Which stages had the best battles to the second? Which power stages robbed rally leaders of their victories? Which stages turned into junkyards of rally cars? It Gets Faster Now! goes through the ten most dramatic stages of the 2019 season. Stages are listed in chronological order. Cover image by Richard Simpson (C). 1. La […]
Read More The 10 most dramatic stages of the 2019 WRC seasonThis post focuses on the Group A era in the 1000 Lakes Rallies. After the exaggerated slowing in 1987, the stages were now again naturally flowing, but modernized with varying road types. There was also now only very little driving in the dark. Each leg reached out to a different direction and the routes were […]
Read More Rally Finland Route History III: 1988-1995The 2019 season introduced a new rally, but a whole round was cancelled along many individual stages. Some events remained as they were, while a few revamped their routes. Stages kept becoming shorter, whereas speeds became sometimes faster, sometimes slower. Cover photo by Richard Simpson / Flickr (C).
Read More WRC season 2019 reviewFinnish gravel roads and Group B cars – what a combination. In these years the 1000 Lakes Rally route headed mostly South-West from Jyväskylä. It introduced its first night breaks, but still included long and tough days of driving. The stages were short but there were a high number of them, with a few double […]
Read More Rally Finland Route History II:1982-1987Rally Australia could have been one of the fastest gravel rallies of the season. The 2019 event had to be cancelled because of raging bushfires. This route preview is retained for future reference. Rally Australia was first introduced to the WRC in 1989. It became soon known for its Langley Park twin-car super special and […]
Read More Route Preview: Rally Australia 2019Rally Finland or 1000 Lakes Rally has always been based in Jyväskylä, but its route has stretched towards various parts of Finland throughout the decades. Stages have come and gone, sometimes altering their route and changing their title. This is an attempt to put all this together. In this blog post series I’m going to […]
Read More Rally Finland Route History I: 1973-1981