33mm are Go
Nasser Al Attiyah’s Subaru Impreza had already run with a 33mm restrictor of the type which will be allowed on FIA championship rallies in 2010 at pre-Rally GB testing. Prodrive contacts say that the power level has been increased by 17-18 bhp compared with the current 32mm restrictor cars, and that the improvement means that the Imprezas should more than match the Super 2000 cars, on gravel rallies at least. On asphalt, the S2000s still seem to be far away. Nasser however was enthralled by the change in the torque characteristic. "There is now a much flatter torque curve through the range, and the car performs very much better". A spokesman for the Autotek team which runs the Al Attiyah car said they had hoped to run the 33m restrictor at the rest Cambrian test rally but on the day this did not happen.

Ban Super 2000s from PCWRC!
Patrik Flodin and the new world champion Armindo Araujo joined forces before the start of Rally GB in deploring the continued use of Super 2000 cars in the PCWRC. Flodin said "even with the new 33mm restrictor next year, the S2000 cars will generally be faster, though if this rally will be wet then the Group Ns will not be at such a disadvantage". Araujo said: "the trouble is that S2000 cars cost so much more than Group N cars, so there is not only a performance differential between the two types of car, but a cost differential as well. Drivers are having to find much bigger budgets for running in PCWRC. Because there is now also the World Cup for S2000 cars, running on a lot of rallies also counting for the PCWRC, it would be much fairer if the FIA no longer allowed S2000 cars compete in the PCWRC". In Araujo’s country Portugal, S2000 cars run on the same events but in a special Group A, not Group N class

FIA Freeze WRC Development
FIA officials confirm that development on World Rally Cars has now been frozen, apart from the chance to apply for minor "variant option" changes. This means there will be not more important design work on the cars challenging for the world championship between now and the end of the current World Rally Car formula at the end of 2010. Serious rally car design work therefore is stagnant until the technical details concerning the operation of the new 1.6 Turbo engines, whether in World Engine or production based format is settled, expected to be at the December 2009 World Motor Sport Council meeting. Insiders believe that the homologation error discovered on the Citroen cars in Rally Australia was a direct result of an administration overload in the team when trying to apply for as many homologation changes as possible before the final deadline arrived.
　
"Ogier is an Investment"
Citroen Racing chief Olivier Quesnel admitted that he had given wrong instructions to Sebastien Ogier when he season started. "We gave him a programme of the first six rallies and told him that his plans would then be reviewed. I think I put him under too much pressure. When we started to enter him on subsequent rallies he started to get better results". Commenting on the Citroen Junior team drivers and the money which their accident was costing, Quesnel said that Evgeniy Novikov decided not to compete in Britain because any further problems them year could have destroyed his career. "I think it is better for him coming back net year with a clear mind. He is a customer and can do what he want he likes, Ogier is our investment for the future".

3mmm