2012 World Touring Car Championship

[Thilo Falkenberg]

Well with Hyundai joining WRC now, it opens the doors for a Hyundai in WTCC due to the same engine formula. Since the factory team will most likely concentrate on WRC, at least a privateer could now buy a WRC engine and develop a WTCC car on their own. Maybe this happens

 

[Ole Marius Myrvold]

Uhm, are a privateer allowed to homologate the car?

I've imagined that this is a "problem" in the FIA series, that you cannot, as a privateer homologate cars.

 

[Thilo Falkenberg]

Uhm, are a privateer allowed to homologate the car?

I've imagined that this is a "problem" in the FIA series, that you cannot, as a privateer homologate cars.

J.A.S. homologated the Honda Accord Euro R a few years back without factory support and Ford's factory support for Arena is also pretty limited. Unlike the first manufactor entry of Ford, the car is not built by Ford (2004 and 2005 two Focus were built by Ford Team RS and entered by Hofield Sport in ETCC and WTCC), but by Arena. As long as the manufactor agrees to the homologation it is no problem.

 

[Ole Marius Myrvold]

So, you need approval of the manufacturer?

 

[Thilo Falkenberg]

Yeah.

 

[Chris Butcher]

Shame, because in BTCC we have BMW, MG, Honda, Vauxhall, Proton, Toyota, Ford and Audi. Of course, the only factory team though is Honda.

 

[Bram Hengeveld]

The airtime of WTCC increased even. Eurosport's qualifying coverage is something rather new. They also show the warm-up and the races.

They do that since 2006 already. Always on Eurosport 1, a channel with a reach of 400 million people, but recently they are putting Qualy sessions away on the second channel or don't broadcast it at all like last weekend.

Eurosport 2, at least here where i live, can only be viewed with a subscription, hence the reach is very much reduced.

Our commercial broadcaster also shows highlights of the WTCC in every F1 weekend but its like two to three weeks old normally.

 

[James Chant]

I imagine that because new car sales are slow, there isn't enough money in the budgets to fulfil a Motorsport programme.

 

[Ole Marius Myrvold]

Yeah.

I think much of the problem is there. I don't get it, if I'm able to secure funding for R&D of a Zastava Touring Car (I love such cars, that are less known, and strange). Why I need approval of Zastava to be able to race it in WTCC, when I can race it in almost every other series on earth.

 

[Thilo Falkenberg]

I think much of the problem is there. I don't get it, if I'm able to secure funding for R&D of a Zastava Touring Car (I love such cars, that are less known, and strange). Why I need approval of Zastava to be able to race it in WTCC, when I can race it in almost every other series on earth.

Well mainly because it is a World Championship with manufactor involvement. The brands want to position themselves against each other. It is not a clubsport/customersport thingy like the whole GT3 category (including its GT1 World Championship) is. Btw, with Zastava you might also need approval of FIAT, depending on the model, since Zastava licenses some FIATs I know.
It is a bit like dvds of films you didn't make or you don't own all rights of: If you show them your friends or a small circle of people it is fine, however you show them large crowds or even use them commecially you need approval by the one who owns the rights.

 

[Thilo Falkenberg]

Still getting into a rage about Eurosport. As if one channel with 8 HOURS tennis wasn't enough. Since the Moto GP days, it's gone downwards.

Menu played Vaillant? I love the comics of Jean and Philippe Graton. I already thought they would use this for a movie again

That bit was unique display of wrong management... They partly even covered the same match on both channels -.- I mean, I can understand it - French Open are a Grand Slam. Ok. I can understand also that if you're covering a grand slam you might not show WSbR live, since it is not a top tier racing series. You also might not show AutoGP live for the same reason. But there is no room for a World Championship race left? I mean seriously. They could have at least done a Eurosport 2 coverage or, as Lotti did in a few years back, sell the rights of the races they can't show live to national broadcasters (they did that with Eurosport 2 covered races here even, which were then shown as simulcast at n-tv aka CNN Germany or as own production at ZDF, the forth largest TV channel over here). It is as bad as this ACO-Eurosport-MotorsTV deal, which allowes Eurosport to show only the last one or two hours of a FIA WEC race live, while MotorsTV has flag-to-flag coverage of all ACO or ACO licensed series (WEC, ELMS, IMSA ALMS). At least they have the flag-to-flag coverage of LeMans again this year.​

/rage

 

[Tom Moreno]

He cracked his front splitter so he lost around 7 tenths per lap the in the 13-14 last laps or so.
However i think he milked it slightly at the end to see if Martin could pass Rockenfeller, he was very close, just a few more laps

Bruno cracked his splitter right in front of us. TV cameras didn't seem to catch it from the replay of the event I saw. Everyone was using the wide curbing on the outside of turn 1 but the very outside edge of it isn't completely straight edged and Bruno went too far out on it and basically hit a spot like a pot hole with an almighty bang. He actually broke away a bit of the paved curbing and the track marshals had a good look at it after the race. I thought at first with the way he slowed up that he may have damaged the suspension with the severeness of the whack he took.

 

[Hampus Andersson]

Bruno cracked his splitter right in front of us. TV cameras didn't seem to catch it from the replay of the event I saw. Everyone was using the wide curbing on the outside of turn 1 but the very outside edge of it isn't completely straight edged and Bruno went too far out on it and basically hit a spot like a pot hole with an almighty bang. He actually broke away a bit of the paved curbing and the track marshals had a good look at it after the race. I thought at first with the way he slowed up that he may have damaged the suspension with the severeness of the whack he took.

Nice info thanks Tom

 

[David Jundt]

...but Michel Vaillant is
i can only agree with Bram, the Vaillant looks so much better than the Cruze!

Yeah, he is French(I've read so many I couldn't say I wouldn't know), but what for? The driver isn't, the team isn't, the country the track is at isn't, nothing was!

So again... why do they come with Michel now?

Because there is nothing else that was in any way French, so who would get the joke in Portugal?

 

[Thilo Falkenberg]

Yeah, he is French(I've read so many I couldn't say I wouldn't know), but what for? The driver isn't, the team isn't, the country the track is at isn't, nothing was!

So again... why do they come with Michel now?

Because there is nothing else that was in any way French, so who would get the joke in Portugal?

I guess because there weren't closer to France yet this season. I mean they could have done it in the former French colony.

 

[Kevin Endermann]

Chevy will leave after this season!

 

[Ivo Simons]

Yeeh!

 

[Thilo Falkenberg]

Don't be too happy. RML, which is the team behind Chevy, will stay in under their own effort even if they are not able to get the team for a new manufactor. The biggest change might be the paint scheme next season if not the car changes.
But GM is currently reorganising itself, since they started to work with PSA (Peugeot-Citroen) a bit ago. This actually is going to kill Opel as independent brand within GM. Opel had a development office in Rüsselsheim which was feeding the european models of GM with "innovation". GM stated that they are concentrating on PSA's developments. From my position it seems like we won't see any GM brand in (European) touring cars anymore. First I thought the departure of Chevy in WTCC makes room for Opel in DTM (that was romoured quiet a while back) but with the newest developments in Detroit, the European motorsports market might be left open for Peugeot/Citroen in future (with the exception of the Corvette GTEs at LeMans most likely).

 

[Bram Hengeveld]

Tarquini & Monteiro confirmed Honda drivers: http://www.racedepartment.com/2012/07/wtcc-tarquini-and-monteiro-sign-for-honda/

 

[Ole Marius Myrvold]

X-F1 drivers, still going strong. Although, Monteiro might not be that strong