The company’s designers made so many changes to improve the performance of the car that they had to release a new BMW 2002 model. Later the company created a special department for rally, which helped to develop the car. The project was led by Helmut Bein, the man who first started in a BMW 1602. The first victories BMW brought drivers Rani Voll and Rauno Altonen, but the only one who achieved good results was Bein, taking first place in West Germany.

The car had a good feel for the track, thereby giving the pilots more power. Bain was always coming up with modifications for rally cars, but BMW didn’t understand his involvement in rallying and financing of the branch was stopped. It is worth mentioning several pilots who brought several victories to the BMW team, Bjorn Valdegaard and Achim Verbold.

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Meanwhile, two potential contenders for the title in WRC-2 Open were finally eliminated. Firstly, it is the Frenchman Yoan Rossel, who managed to lose the third position because of the “roof” on the final Power Stage and lost all chances for the crown (if he had arrived without incident, he could have become a vice-leader of the championship and a serious threat to Mikkelsen). Secondly, Nikolay Gryazin lost even theoretical chances for the final success – however, the “gesture of goodwill” in Finland, where the Russian crashed his Skoda Fabia Rally2 evo during the shakedown, helped him more. The situation is similar in the WRC-2 Junior, where only two can win the title – Finn Emil Lindholm (he has enough to take 10 points in Catalonia or Japan to become the champion) and Briton Chris Ingram (he has one more start left, but even a victory does not guarantee his overall success). Quite an interesting picture is observed in the “veteran” category of WRC-2 Masters, which unexpectedly turned out to be surprisingly popular – still we have ten crews that have started at least three rounds. The Italian Mauro Miele still retains the leadership here, but the German Armin Kremer is pressing hard on him – he has already won his third victory, moved to the third position and is now preparing for the next round in New Zealand. You can be sure that in all three categories of WRC-2 (Open, Junior, Masters) a lot will be decided in New Zealand and Catalonia – let’s see how the course of events will be.

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– Semi-automatic transmission

The long-forgotten Group C rally went beyond cyberpunk modifications. Perhaps the most significant innovation in this class was the double-clutch gearbox developed for the Porsche 962 in 1984. It allowed gear shifting without disengaging the clutch and was the forerunner of the semi-automatic paddle shifter boxes still used in Formula One today.
Subshifters never became the industry standard, as many predicted in the early ‘noughties, but remain a popular option on many cars, from various Porsche models to the Honda Jazz and Citroen. F1.

– Disc brakes

This technology is still being refined today. Under the influence of Formula 1, conventional cars increasingly do not use steel brake discs, but their lighter and more heat-resistant ceramic counterparts. Of course, Formula 1 cars are still far ahead of production cars in terms of technology – most of them are already made of carbon fiber.

– Active suspension

Conventional suspension can be described as passive: It moves as the road dictates. Active suspension, on the other hand, does not rely on unreliable surfaces, raising and lowering the chassis for each wheel and thus providing improved handling, better traction and a smoother ride.
Early versions of active suspension simply adjusted the stiffness of the shock absorbers, but Formula 1 has taken this technology to new heights and now data about the road surface is uploaded to the onboard computer using special sensors installed in different parts of the car.

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Some facts

In fact, after the New Zealand absolute triumph of Rowanperry in the final two stages of the WRC-2022 (in Catalonia and Japan), only two questions remained open in the major league – will Toyota retain its leadership in the team standings and who exactly will become the second or third winners of the championship in the absolute standings? The Spanish round put an end to the team confrontation – the Toyotas won the second victory in a row and finally buried all the hopes of rivals from Hyundai Motorsport to somehow “reach” the fight to the final in Japan… It should be noted that in this rapid October counteroffensive of Toyota Gazoo Racing WRT, a decisive role was played by Sébastien Ogier, who decided to take part in the final three stages – the multiple world champion finally replaced Esapekka Lappi, won the second position in New Zealand and the victory in Catalonia, thanks to which for two stages brought to the team’s treasury 51 points! In fact, the Frenchman saved the Japanese-Finnish team, which in August-September began to rapidly “collapse” due to the failures of Kalle Rovanperi (Belgium, Greece) and Elfin Evans (during the performances in Greece, New Zealand, Catalonia, the Welshman managed to score only 8 points). What did this spectacular Toyota counteroffensive on the New Zealand and Catalan tracks performed by Rowanperry and Ogier look like in numbers?

Sébastien Augier played a crucial role

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