Despite the strange arch incident and small gripes about the itinerary, World Rally Championship drivers have moved to praise both the organization and the stages of last week’s Rally Latvia.
A new addition to the WRC calendar for 2024, Latvia was promoted from its usual European Rally Championship slot, rebranded from Rally Liepāja to Rally Latvia as the event also touched the city of Riga.
Although the nature of the high-speed stages was similar to the previous round in Poland and upcoming Rally Finland, the profile was different and the organizers implemented an atypical itinerary too.
Instead of following the traditional cloverleaf format, with a set of stages run in the morning and then directly repeated in the afternoon, four of Friday’s seven stages were first-pass tests and staggeringly just one of Saturday’s eight tests was a repeat.
While that caused championship leader Thierry Neuville a definite problem in terms of road cleaning, the Hyundai pilot was complimentary of the stages themselves.
Road-sweeper Neuville enjoyed the stages themselves
“The stages are quite nice, to be honest,” Neuville told DirtFish. “I enjoyed the driving as well.
“Obviously, there were no lines in front on the first day, so I could use all of the road. It was fun, you just couldn’t look at the time board because that was very frustrating because it felt on the edge all the time!”
Team-mate Esapekka Lappi was equally positive about the event.
“I cannot find much negatives,” he said. “It’s been very well organized since the recce already.
“Massive amount of people everywhere [but] still we didn’t have any traffic jams so it’s a big plus from my side.”
Lappi was impressed with crowds
The volume, and management, of spectators also impressed M-Sport’s Adrien Fourmaux. And he enjoyed the stages despite some concerns after recce regarding the number, and placement, of anti-cut devices.
“It’s a good rally, definitely,” Fourmaux said. “That was much better in the stages than it was during the recce. During the recce, I was like, there are too many wooden posts, etc. But at the end, I think it was really OK and correct.
“The stages were interesting. Some parts I think we could remove, where it’s flat out everywhere. But there were some of the stages that were really, really interesting.
“Actually, also we can see that the spectators were mega on this rally. That was really good. They were cheering everybody. They really liked the rally. So I think it’s a really good rally.”
WRC2 winner Oliver Solberg complained at the end of one of Saturday’s stages that the itinerary featured too much “dead time”, with three regroups as well as a service punctuating the day, but on the whole loved being back in the country where his rallying career began.
“Fantastic,” Solberg said. “It’s nice to be back where I started my career and they’ve done an amazing organization. You see how beautiful it is everywhere where they organize all these kind of things.
“Except the chicanes were s***, but the rest was amazing.”
Elfyn Evans took a similar view to Solberg, but was another to be impressed by the level of organization.
“I think there’s a lot of positives and a few things that maybe need to be looked at,” the Toyota driver surmised.
“I think in terms of organization, they’ve done an incredible job for the first effort, let’s say. Even better than some established events, I would say. From that side, I’m sure it’s been a huge effort and therefore, congratulations to all the organizers.
Evans' only real gripe was with "unnatural" anti-cut devices and chicanes
“But, yeah, I just think with so many anti-cuts, it’s a bit unnatural. It’s a shame we have to have so many of these chicanes. I think a few in a stage is fine, but when you have so many it’s a bit unnatural, spoils the character a little.
“And then of course the whole issue with the first pass thing, because we know the sweeping has such an effect. So there’s a couple of things to look at, but it’s not a bad rally, that’s sure.”
Rally Latvia’s WRC future is unclear, as an ERC return beckons for 2025. Rally Estonia will retake its place on the WRC schedule.
Tänak incident being investigated
The SS14 incident, where Evans lost the rear and took out the support structure for an inflatable arch which then fell onto the stage in Ott Tänak’s path, was the only major organizational hiccup during last week’s event.
Tänak called for the FIA to investigate the sequence of events and why the stage was not red-flagged for him, which the FIA confirmed it will be doing in conjunction with Rally Latvia and Hyundai Motorsport.
“Following the incident involving Car 8 [Tänak ] on Special Stage 14, a thorough review by the FIA is ongoing,” it said in a statement.
“The driver, Ott Tänak and team representative met with the FIA representatives on site to review the situation, which all agreed was potentially dangerous.
“Discussing the situation, Tänak agreed that his comments following the stage were not in the best interest of the sport, but that they were made in the moments immediately following the incident. He apologized for his comments about Rally Control but welcomed the upcoming review.
“Hyundai Motorsport, the organizer and the FIA are collaborating to better understand the incident and to work together towards the continuous improvement of the safety systems in the sport, which is a critical goal of the FIA.”
