Volkswagen to leave WRC, effective immediately

It has been announced four hours ago that Volkswagen is to leave the WRC effective immediately. The drivers have been already notified. Official communiqué scheduled for Wednesday, it seems.

Rgds

 

Time for Lancia to come back. Hu! oh, Lancia is dead. Thanks, Sergio!

 

They already had spent money in next year's car and had signed the drivers. I just don't get it.

 

Lancia was dying before Sergio. We'll be lucky if he manages to breathe some life into Alfa Romeo.

 

https://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/126949/volkswagen-confirms-wrc-exit

Rgds

 

Are we witnessing the final fall of motorsports?

 

You're witnessing a company that needs to save some money.

 

That implies motorsport is not a lucrative advertising platform anymore

 

Has nothing to do with advertising or that.

Has everything to do with a 15 billion $ bill for the diesel engine recalls, the fact that VAG is switching from diesel to hybrid/battery cars as their main product line over next 10-15 years, the need for resources and manpower to design those cars.

Same reason Audi is out of WEC.

Porsche will follow suit in 2018 in terms of leaving WEC.

LMP1 Hybrids will "die" and there will be LMP1 Privateer rules/cars to replace them.

Happens every decade or two....

 

yep, repeat the cycle...

 

I don't mind LMP1 hybrid dying, since it's not very well supported, but LMP1 itself is gone.

The ACO is turning endurance into a specs series now.

Just look at LMP2 and LMP3. All with OAK/Ligier or ORECA chassis and Nissan engines.

If it wasn't for the GTE, endurance racing would be boring to follow.

 

LMP1 Privateer is actually a class that a lot of "race car" mfg's are looking at (for chassis supply)and also the big production car mfg's are looking at (to supply customer engines.)

ACO is working thru rules for those cars now. Expect news by next LeMans.

I know Porsche is currently looking at how to do a "919" non hybrid customer car.

Peugeot just announced they would be interested in getting back into LMP1 as engine supplier for LMP1 privateer cars.

I am personally involved with another mfg over supplying a customer engine program for this class.

ACO does not want LMP2 to be the lead class. So starting at end of 2017-maybe end of 2018 expect to see a change to privateer LMP1 racing at LeMans.

Could be okay. Done right and you will see a lot more than 6 LMP1 cars running-as you see today.

 

What happened to AER? Around 2014 or 2015 they released what seemed to be a pretty competitive turbo V6 direct injection LMP1 engine for non-mfr teams. They should be well placed if LMP1 evolves in this direction.

 

I think that to be viable, LMP1s have do be allowed in more than one championship. At the moment, it's WEC or nothing.

LMP1s should also be allowed in ELMS, IMSA, ALMS which only cater for LMP2 & 3 at the moment.

 

Their last customer was Rebellion, I believe, and they just pulled out of LMP1 to join LMP2 next year.

Small engine manufacturers will only survive if their is a solid customer base.

 

Of course it would be great if all the various race organizations could get together and have one set of rules. But IMSA/Nascar has always wanted it "their way"-and sometimes for the right reasons. But just such a waste overall.

And as long as LeMans has an LMP1 privateer class that has a chnace of letting these cars finish on the podium I know of quite a few individuals who will spend 5 - 10 million dollars for that chance!

Must be nice to be rich like that...

 

I agree with you. However i would like to add something. I believe that they didn't come in WRC to stay. They came, they conquered (in many different kind of motorsports), they raised the bar really high and now they're leaving. Of course the dieselgate was something ugly for the company, the same goes for the fines and the high compensations...but to be honest, whoever took that decision, made a really big mistake, at least not now. They could take that decision next year. The good thing in this story is that the team will continue to develop the R5 Polo for the privateers.

I would love to see Toyota against the others, especially VW.

Really a shame....

 

Big companies like the VAG Group have to answer to shareholders who want their share of profit every year.

It's hard to sell them a competition budget when the company is facing huge fines and a loss of market. That's why racing programmes get swiftly cancelled. The management has to find the money somewhere to please the investors who expect a dividend.

I have been at a few AGMs, and things can turn ugly when the shareholders don't get what they expect!! Justifying a racing budget become very difficult to justify sometime.

On a different note, I thought Citroen was going back to the WRC with a C3.

 

Correct.

Also new Toyota... I think WRC will survive without VW, and probably it will be more interesting as VW was almost buying the victory with their oversized budget compared to the rest.

 

That's a bit unfair, I think.

Do you think Citroen didn't have a very generous budget when they were "buying" (your expression) Sebastien Loeb NINE championships ?

I guess you have to invest heavily to have any chance to win a title these days.

 

They were for some of those 9 years. Their main rival was Ford, that cut off the money supply to Malcolm Wilson and had to run almost as a private team.