Portugal’s itinerary has proven to be a surprisingly contentious issue.
Drivers, almost universally, did not like it: they felt the total hours spent on the road – not the stages themselves, but the entire amount including parc ferme check-out, services and road sections – when combined with other activities like video work was so long that it meant insufficient rest between legs.
For the organizers it was important to fulfil obligations to the regions which back the event’s ongoing presence in the WRC.
Both sides of this argument have valid points. But it looks like the emotive reaction has led some to lose sight of the fundamental issues underlying it.
Every time this subject has been brought up, someone inevitably harps on about the RAC Rally in the 1980s in reaction.
It criss-crossed the entire United Kingdom. There were 30-something stages per day. This was proper rallying. Everyone’s gone soft now.
This is not a good argument. It’s apples and oranges stuff. It’s missing the point.
The old RAC did not have proper pacenotes with a thorough recce beforehand. Co-drivers were calling corners from an Ordnance Survey map. That cut out a lot of preparation that would have otherwise immediately preceded the rally itself. And non-driving time pressures were less of a problem. There’s more telemetry to analyze than ever before. There was no plethora of onboard video to relentlessly study.
Rovanperä himself was the prime example of how bad it gets when you have to compromise sleep on an event. On last year’s Rally Poland, when he was drafted in as a last-minute substitute for Sébastien Ogier, he fell asleep while sat in front of his laptop watching back onboards, as he desperately played catchup to the others who’d spent hours upon hours of studying stage videos before recceing the rallying.
Rovanperä proved in Poland last year that he could win with minimal preparation and rest. But in his view, just because you can, doesn't mean you should
I did not get to live Group B or Group A as a working professional. But I’ve been told plenty of stories of what it was like back then by the people who lived it. There is a key difference: for all the intensity of the uptime, there were also periods of subsequent downtime to match. And media requirements have ramped up significantly: there was no live TV coverage to worry about, no social media reels to film, fewer press conferences.
What’s being missed in all of this is not that a 15-hour day is too long. In isolation, it is a valid challenge. But stacking consecutive days with early start times and late finishes – regardless of the number of competitive stages involved – is problematic.
But what about the 24 Hours of Le Mans, you cry!
The car is doing 24 hours. The driver is not.
A drive-time limit of four hours per stint in a six-hour window exists and no-one is allowed to complete more than 14 hours of driving beforehand. There is no on-track activity for those competing in the 24-hour main race between free practice four finishing at midnight on the Thursday until the 15-minute pre-race warmup on Saturday at midday.
Le Mans is considered the ultimate test of endurance – but drivers' ability to rest and recover, both in the lead-up to the main event and then between stints at the wheel, is key to maintaining their performance while at the wheel
Le Mans drivers get what the WRC brethren were asking for but did not receive: adequate out-of-car rest between intense stints behind the wheel.
The same principle applies to any form of intense physical activity. Speak to any elite athlete and they’ll tell you rest and recovery is vital to performing when it’s time to step up to the plate. Or the driving seat. Or whatever it may be.
If you’ve ever done strength training at the gym, you’ll be familiar with this pattern. You exert a high intensity effort over a short period of time, rest, and then put in more reps – a bit like special stages versus liaison sections on a rally. Once you’ve finished off that strenuous workout, the thing that allows your muscles to repair themselves is sleep. Failing to recover properly makes the next workout more difficult and more painful.
Hydration and refuelling is also an important aspect of recovery. Guess what? There are rules restricting when and how drivers can do this. Article 56.2.2. of the sporting regulations stipulate the only time teams are allowed to give their drivers food and drink is during media zones, service parks, tire fitting zones, remote services and regroups.
You might argue – why aren’t the teams giving them adequate supplies in-car to then consume on the road sections? Again, it’s not as simple as that (this is rallying – nothing ever is simple. That’s the point).
Road bicycle racing also tests endurance. A typical Tour de France stage can last anything from four to seven hours. And they’ll do almost a week’s worth of stages before getting a rest day. But do they carry all their water and food for the day ahead with them? Not much. A team car follows the riders and one team member – a domestique whose job it is to support the efforts of their team leader – drops back and retrieves the fresh fuel to distribute to their teammates. There’s also musettes distributed mid-stage at designated feeding zones containing gel packs, sandwiches and other nourishment, And all this happens mid-stage, while the clock is running.
The cars get dedicated refuelling zones. The competitors have to try and refuel themselves whenever they happen to have a spare minute – which on Rally Portugal was hard to come by
The length of the rally, the stage, the liaison, whatever it may be, is not the point. It’s the time in between that’s being forgotten here. To perform, you must first rest and recover.
Whatever was happening in the 1980s has little to do with today. Humanity’s understanding of how our bodies function has continued to evolve. Sports science was in its infancy four decades ago – it’s now fundamental to unlocking the maximum performance of professional drivers. You can no longer win rallies on a diet of cigarettes and an exercise regime of going for a jog when it tickles your fancy, no matter how bursting with natural talent you may be.
Speaking of road bicycle racing: did you know 1904 Tour de France winner Henri Cornet’s daily intake was 11 liters of hot chocolate, four liters of tea and even champagne? An athlete in the 1980s would surely have found such an approach absurd.
I feel sorry for the stakeholders involved in dealing with this because all the players in this debate have a valid point. Organizers need to be able to cover plenty of ground to take in as many supporting regions as possible. Schedules also need to be suitably condensed for logistical and promotional reasons. And the drivers need a basic level of recovery time to function properly when they’re throwing 130mph metal missiles six inches away from trees, barriers, buildings and cliff edges.
