The bureau in charge of the World Touring Car Championship have acted to rein in the BMWs than ran away with the first two rounds of the championship.
Augusto Farfus, Jorg Muller and reigning champion Andy Priaulx dominated the races in Curitiba, Brazil with their Seat, Alfa Romeo and Chevrolet rivals lagging far behind.
BMW’s 3 Series originally received a 15kg weight break in exchange for the team’s agreement to use a rolling start in the first race of each event, to neutralise their car’s advantage by dint of having rear wheel drive.
Now their rivals will run 25kg light for at least the next round at Zandvoort, though it remains to be seen if the change will be permanent.
With car’s weights constantly being fiddled with by rules changes and success ballast, it’s time the WTCC worked out a reasonable compromise between the front and rear wheel drive cars and stuck to it.
The competitive first round of this year’s BTCC, where BMWs, Seats and various other cars all raced each other closely, proves such a compromise is possible.
chunter
6th April 2007, 21:15
At least I know I’m not alone in thinking ‘success ballast’ or ‘penalty weight’ is counterproductive. (A good driver knows how to use the weight to advantage, and if you think I’m crazy for saying it, the teams are often allowed to decide where in the car the ballast goes, and of course, controlled weight shift can help good drivers corner and pass.)
If the difference between engine placements is so great, they should be racing for different championships.
Keith Collantine
7th April 2007, 23:29
You can expect a fair few rants about the evils of ‘success ballast’ on this blog…