Live coverage and the WRC

I touched upon it in my previous blog and the more I’ve thought about it the more I believe the WRC needs it – live televised coverage.

Rally Monte Carlo, an IRC event, received a record 14hours of live coverage last month. While this weekends’ GP2 Asia race from Abu Dhabi was also broadcast live (well, from lap two at least) and even the Race of Champions from Beijing was shown live on Eurosport.

So why not the WRC?

WRC fans are among the most passionate in sport. These are people who will spend 3 days in all kinds of weather to see their favourite drivers and teams. Many of them will camp in forests huddled around makeshift fires forsaking simple luxuries for the chance to see a world rally car hurtling at terrifying speeds right under their noses.

Unfortunately though it’s no secret that the WRC has suffered in recent years. Manufacturers have pulled out left, right and centre and without a ‘star’ Brit a lot of the viewing public in this country have lost interest.

If you were walk up to Joe public in the street and ask who they consider to be the great drivers of our time their answers would be Michael Schumacher, Lewis Hamilton and, most probably, The Stig (!). Mention Sebastien Loeb, Mikko Hirvonen or Petter Solberg to them and they’d look at you like you were an idiot. Most wouldn’t even be able to pick the 6-time world championship winner Loeb out of a police line-up. Yet he is pretty much the Schumacher of rallying (albeit without the cheating and ramming his competitors off the road).

When Eurosport showed Rally Monte Carlo figures indicated that 12million people tuned in and it makes you wonder whether if they offered the same media attention to the WRC would it get an equal amount or maybe even more viewers?

To me this seems like a viable option. I understand that it would be a huge undertaking for a broadcast team and cost a lot of money but if they were to show three live stages a day I believe viewing figures would soar and maybe more teams and sponsors would see this as the series to be involved in.

Until then, those of us living in Britain will have to spend Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights watching daily edited highlights at 10.20pm on Motors TV.
I suppose we should be grateful that it’s being shown at all in some capacity.