Yohan Rossel and Citroën retain their victory in Chile

The classification of rally of Chile is finally official and the result in the WRC2 category will not change (unless an appeal is made!). Yohan Rossel and Florian Barral no longer have to worry about whether the time change granted in SS11 (40'' less in Lola 2) will be modified or not. During the event, they had caught up with Oliver Solberg who had set off just ahead of them after replacing a flat tire. In the fog, the crew had made their presence known, but the Skoda driver had not wanted to let them pass and the two cars had finished the SS one behind the other. The DG Compétition team had made a request for a correction and the panel of stewards had agreed, modifying the time by removing 40'' from the French Rally2. At the end of the rally, Rossel had won, but Oliver Solberg's Toksport team had filed a protest... which had been rejected. The story could have ended there, but Andrew Wheatley, the FIA ​​Road Sport Director, asked (on October 3) the Stewards of the Chile Rally to review their decision due to the discovery of significant and relevant new elements as allowed by Article 14.1.1 of the FIA ​​International Sporting Code.

The meeting took place on Wednesday, October 16, while the crews were in the middle of reconnaissance (which was not very smart…) and the verdict was expected before the start of the CER. It finally came after the first special.

Seven pages long, Steward Decision No. 7 still bears the stamp Rally Chile Biobio 2024, came to ratify the choices that had been made by the college of stewards in Concepción. In this long and very procedural bulletin, several articles explain the motivations for rejecting the request of Andrew Wheatley and the FIA:

5.9. The Sporting Stewards maintain the principle that the allocation of corrected or theoretical times which is provided for in the Sporting Regulations of the WRC 2024 FIA for certain cases which do not however specifically include a crew claiming to have been delayed by another car.

5.10. In the interests of sporting fairness in competitions and with reference to Art. 1.1.5 of the 2024 WRC Sporting Regulations, the Stewards may consider exercising their authority under Article 11.9.2.a and Article 11.9.3.j of the 2024 FIA International Sporting Code. The Stewards may therefore decide that, if they consider the time loss to be significant and do not consider it to be a “racing incident”, a corrected time may be issued upon demonstration of extraordinary circumstances that led to the perceived time loss.

5.11. In this particular case, the competitor was able to establish that there were mitigating and extraordinary circumstances which led to the loss of time in this section of the SS11 event.

5.12. The stewards have examined this case thoroughly and carefully. In light of all the circumstances, the stewards conclude that the reasonable safety measures taken by car #21 justified a 40-second correction to the time lost on SS11.

If all this seems very technical and complicated, it is important to remember that the result remains that it was given at the finish of the Chile rally. Oliver Solberg did not win the WRC2 title in Chile, but he can still do so depending on the results of the last two races. Yohan Rossel still has a chance, but he must win at the CER and then he will have to wait for the result of the Japan rally. If Sami Pajari gets at least 2nd place at Toyota City, the title will go to the Finn.