RallySport Magazine’s ‘State of Australian rallying’ survey has been a huge success, with 340 readers of the website giving their thoughts on where the sport should be heading.
While there are many positive comments and lots of people are happy with the direction of the sport, there is also a clear indication that there are areas that need to be improved upon.
The cost of the sport continues to be a major concern for competitors, as do constant rule changes in the sport, particularly at Australian Rally Championship level.
The question “Tell us how rallying can be improved?” generated nearly 250 passionate responses, with many readers not afraid to really tell it how it is (in their opinion).
Thoughts were many and varied on the best rally in Australia, but Rally Australia, the Alpine Rally and Rally South Australia featured prominently.
The key results from the survey appear below, with PDF downloads available for some questions where a written response was required.
As a matter of courtesy, and to help with the future of Australian rallying, the full ‘State of Australian rallying’ results will be sent to CAMS and the Australian Rally Commission.
Our thanks to R6 Web Design for their support of the survey.
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Read our readers' thoughts on the rules governing the Australian Rally Championship HERE. |
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Of the 21% who selected "Other", most were of the opinion that all cars should be eligible for the ARC. |
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Of the 37% who selected "Other", most would be more likely to spectate if the ARC was for all types of cars. There were several passionate comments on this issue, including: "Better spectator information (maps that are readable with gps co-ords on them) and signage in the area/ at spectator points was available, FREE ENTRY TO SPECTATOR POINTS and free transport (i.e. free buses to and from spec points). If we want people there, we need to pay them and bus them in! Rallying does not offer enough for spectators from a value perspective vs other competing forms of entertainment. We cannot afford to keep burning spectators, who these days go away and tell hundreds if not thousands of people on social media how they 'got ripped off/ poor value for money' paid for tickets but couldn't find the spectator point, etc etc etc. We as a sport are reaping what we have sewn for far too long. I won't pay to spectate a rally...but I'm more than happy to pay for a ticket to nitro circus when it comes to town. That aside, I'm not at all convinced we need spectators in forests anyway. The Rally GB has over 1 million of them, they get in the way and are a safety liability (they even have to ask them not to come to the event!!!), yet the event and competitors still struggle for commercial backing? Our medium is not a few thousand bums in the forest, marketing people want to be reaching millions of people with measurable results." And another: "Spectators aren't so concerned with the type of car. it's the fact that spectator points are often difficult to get to and you see very little from them. Arena type super special stages could draw more people and their interest to the rally." |
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Q18: Tell us how rallying can be improved? |
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| Of those who selected "Other", most answers related to rule changes, family commitments, or a former competitor's age. |
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Q37. Do you have any other comments on how rallying in Australia could be improved? |
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