Endurance Road Rally Championship 2009

If you want to find out more about this exciting branch of motor sport but are confused or baffled by the blue book and the technical regulations then here's a beginner's guide to Endurance Rallying:
 
Keen supporter and the main man behind the formula Phillip Young has produced an insight in to this formula and the ideal behind it.
If you want a handy brochure for the 2009 season with the championship rounds and some questions and answers then please GO HERE.

A Guide to Endurance Rallying for newcomers…
Endurance Rally is a new phenomenon in British Rallying – the only totally all-new initiative in many years. Here are a few notes on what it is…and what it’s not.
 
The cars: The cars are based on similar regulations that ran the World Cup Rallies which started it all – long distance events on open roads with competitive sections known as Selectifs, where the car is timed to the second. The events went drove to Dakar, Tunisia, Athens – becoming the first rally to ever enter Albania – and Morocco and back to the UK. They were so successful the MSA, Britain’s governing motor-sport body, adopted the formula for a club scene at home. Around 200 cars have been built in total to the formula.
 
All cars are a maximum of 1400cc. You can not modify the engine, gearbox, final drive, or the bodywork, apart from sensible things like the sunroof (which you can keep, but film must be stuck to the underside) and removing the rear parcel shelf. You can change the front seats, and you can change the steering wheel. The rest is standard. Carpets, headlining, even the back seat (at the moment, we hope this might change as its tricky fitting say two spare wheels in, with a rollover bar). That’s the philosophy.
 
What can you change? The suspension can be uprated. That doesn’t mean Proflex suspension with separate reservoirs – that’s out. You can not change the pick up points. It means uprating – stronger springs, shocks. You can reinforce the underside with a sump shield, tank guard, change the route of the brake and fuel lines (or, protect them).
 
It’s simple, cheap, and easy-access. You need safety equipment. A fire extinguisher, full harness belts (Luke road-rally belts being lighter and far cheaper than stage belts, have proved ideal), and you need a minimum of a single hoop rollover bar (many fit something more substantial, but that is up to you – its your head).
 
The events: There is a range of events, from one day to weekend, to several days, you can find out more by checking out the national Endurance Championship, on this website. These events make up the basis of the championship.
 
Events have favoured the principle of a control tyre – this limits costs, enhances driver input, as no tyre is dead right for every type of condition…wet leaves under the trees, mud, rain, gravel, dry tarmac, ice and even snow…one tyre makes it a real challenge. The Championship Control tyre is an all-rounder with reinforced sidewalls from Sportway. The Endurance scene tries to limit grip with road-pattern tyres, this reduces damage to surfaces considerably.
 
You get timed tests on private ground or forests, farm tracks, stately homes, ranging in surface from mud, typical Forestry Commission ground like Kielder, or dead smooth gravel as found in the South West, all sorts. Here its fastest man wins – you are timed to the second. The course is designed so that no car averages more than 40 mph. Sounds slow – in effect, its fun, and, in the car, faster than you think!
 
The events have a road rally element, as the Forumula sits within the MSA’s road rallying umbrella. This is about low cost, easy access rallying, where the speed is allowed to be greater than road rallying’s 30 mph once we go off the road as the cars are carrying safety equipment.
 
You do not need a helmet, although many wear one. You most certainly do not need overalls – they are not allowed.
 
Sponsorship stickers are also not permitted.
 
What its not: This is not about modifying a car to the ultimate. If that is what you want to do, there are other rallies, for small cars including a championship for 1400s, where this is permitted. You can get 190 bhp out of a 1400cc Vauxhall engine, and if that’s your ambition, Endurance is not for you. What Endurance does is give you longer events than most club stage rallies (Enduro types would find 45 miles of going up and down the same bit of track all day and no night time driving boring – the Enduro Navigators would probably nod off – Endurance is therefore another culture, and a different scene). If you have come from Historic Rallying, or, dropping out of Stage Rallying because you have never got near the front, and can’t stand the damage to your cheque book, you might find a home within Endurance Rallying…but, it is rather “old skool” is its attitude to what is considered real rallying.