Some thoughts for 2013

The world is still in a big financial crisis and the costs of racing, around the world, continue to spiral upwards. It has just been announced that the Auto GP series, which accompanies the WTCC at some events, has decided to cancel their race in Russia due to the very high costs for the teams. This is totally understandable. The Russians are keen to expand their involvement with international motor sport and I can see the marketing value of the WTCC and also the Superbike series. The cars and the bikes do resemble something that you can buy and use on the road. An Auto GP car does not. The Superbikes were there last year and the crowd attendance was quite good. Maybe having Lada back in the WTCC will provide a crowd as big as the 70,000 we had in Hungary last year. The World Superbikes are racing in India in 2013, do you think that this might be the next new venue for WTCC ???
I have written before about my dismay concerning the event in Morocco. The huge costs to the teams and the fact that I just do not see which part of the population, the WTCC is being marketed at. There is talk that negotiations are in place to try to help the Truckies avoid "some" of the unnecessary aggravation which we encounter in Tangiers docks. Driving from Tangiers to Marrakesh is actually quite pleasant and easy. Traffic on the roads is minimal. I just hope that any teams who drive through Latvia to Russia, do not encounter the queue of trucks that you can see in this video made on the way to the Superbikes race in 2012.

The cost of driving a truck around Europe is also on the increase. Germany has decided that they are now going to extend their toll system to include dual carriageway roads. Portugal's toll system still seems to be causing problems for the Portuguese drivers but still does not recognise non Portuguese number plates. The UK government are thinking of introducing a toll system for trucks and when you read how they are going to implement this, any teams in the UK will have comply. Considering that so many countries in the European Community seem to be striving to have the same set of laws and regulations, how come each European country has different types of truck tolls and so many different ways of collecting it? The EEC Directive which governs the Truckies driving hours, seems to be ever expanding and is liable to burst under its own weight of new sub-regulations which it keeps adding every year. There has even been talk that Germany "may" be looking into the viability of Digital Tachographs and it was them that designed the bloody things!!!! I do think that this is just the opposers of the Digital system voicing their opinion, albeit quite loudly. A new exhaust emission class is being introduced for trucks in 2013. We will now have Euro VI(Euro 6) and while this should not affect race teams, who generally use quite new trucks, it is evidence of the increasing costs of moving these race cars around the world. Older trucks are already excluded when driving through certain parts of Europe if they do not meet emission laws.

The start of the WTCC season is still over a month away and we have to get our trucks inspected soon for safety checks. There is still some talk about new teams appearing for 2013 and whilst Honda and the new Rene Munnich Seat team (ALL INKL.COM) have been already been testing.