Morrie Chandler: cost of competing needs to be affordable
WRC rallies commission president Morrie Chandler has spoken to Motorsport News about the recent withdrawal of several manufacturers from the series and insists the sport is not experiencing a crisis, but said it is down to his organisation to make the cost of competing affordable.
He states that the bolt-on kit of performance parts (re: the world rally car technical regulations for 2010) needs to be simple and affordable.
Chandler explained to MN:
At the end of the day we've lost four cars but we've got to see what we can do to save costs. It's not a crisis but it puts the emphasis on what we've been doing over the recent period by looking at how costs can be reduced across the cars and the championship.
There's a directive from the World Council that the kit must be simple and must be relatively cheap. What we're saying is it's in a box, and you can bolt it on. If I've got a Super 2000 car and I'm doing national rallies in New Zealand, for example, and I decide I want to have a go at the WRC when it comes to my country then I will be able to hire the kit, bolt it on my car, do the WRC round, take the kit off my car, pay the hire fee and carry on. It needs to be that simple. That's the approach the technical people have been asked to take and that's the mentality. The kit should total between 20-30,000 Euros [around £25,000].
Cutting costs from the cars has been supported by the WMSC but we need to go a step further and look at the events themselves. This could not only help the competitors but organisers are going to face a lot of challenges in financing their events so we need to help them."
The FIA appointed technical working group (which is currently discussing the final specification of the bolt-on kit of performance parts) findings could be implemented by the WMSC before the next meeting in February, if the body permits its members to submit a fax vote.
Photo: wrc.com
Source: Motorsport News
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