The organizers of the World Rally Championship (WRC) would like to add a rally in the Middle East to the WRC calendar – if possible as early as the 2023 season. WRC Events Director Simon Larkin describes it as a desert rally to the English-language edition of ‘Motorsport. com’ as the missing piece of the puzzle. And the WRC is also continuing to work on an event in the USA.
“If we look at the calendar, we have a good snow event [Schweden]we have Africa [Safari-Rallye in Kenia]we have the Acropolis Rally in Greece and these are the events that we wanted to bring back,” says Larkin.
“I think an event in the Middle East, and a desert rally in particular, is what’s missing from the puzzle,” Larkin continued. “It is our ambition to bring such an event into the World Rally Championship, even as early as next year. We are working towards this goal.”
Desert Rally likely in Saudi Arabia
The WRC last appeared in the Middle East eleven years ago. In 2008, 2010 and 2011, Rally Jordan was part of the WRC calendar. It is questionable whether Jordan will be a possible venue again. A desert rally in Saudi Arabia, where the Dakar Rally has been held since 2020, is more likely.
This is intended to continue the global expansion course of the WRC, after the championship had mostly been held in Europe in the past two years due to the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We’d like to do a calendar where we compete on every continent except Antarctica,” says Larkin. “That’s what the World Cup needs and that’s what we had planned for 2020 and we want to get back to absolute normality next year.”
USA and the search for the right place
The USA, one of the most important car markets in the world, remains another destination for the WRC, albeit in the medium term. “The United States is attractive to every single player in the championship,” said Larkin. “We know there’s a huge following there because we see that in the viewership across all of our platforms.”
There are already suitable figureheads for rallying. “There aren’t many other countries that we go to where we already have ambassadors like Travis Pastrana and Ken Block who are already involved in the sport,” Larkin said.
“We see that having an event there is a great base for the WRC. We just have to find the right city for it.” The WRC was last driven in 1988 with the Olympus Rally in Washington State in the USA.