The World Rally Championship is set to drop hybrid power from its Rally1 cars, beginning from next season.
The future of hybrid power in the WRC’s top class has proved to be a long-running saga this year with the debate re-ignited following a mid-season change to the hybrid unit user guide from control supplier Compact Dynamics.
Prior to last month’s Central European Rally, the future of hybrid power in Rally1 was put to an FIA e-vote. Today the matter was discussed during a WRC Commission meeting where Motorsport.com understands it was agreed to remove hybrid power from Rally1 cars, starting from next year.
This decision is however yet to be officially ratified by the FIA, which is likely to happen at the next World Motor Sport Council meeting.
This is the second U-turn over the use of hybrid power, introduced alongside the new Rally1 regulations in 2022, this year.
In February, the FIA’s working group formed to “evaluate and recommend the future direction of rallying” proposed to remove hybrid power as part of raft of changes for 2025.
However, WRC teams pushed back against the changes, resulting in the current Rally1 regulations staying put for 2025 and 2026 in what was seen as a U-turn from the FIA.
But the future of hybrid power came under the spotlight again following the introduction of Compact Dynamics safety guidelines at the Acropolis Rally Greece in September.
The new regulations stipulate that if the 130kW hybrid unit suffers three shock errors over 15G or one over 25G, it has to be stripped apart and sent back to the supplier for a full repair that can take months to complete. Previously these units could be reset on site during a rally.
Teams believe the change will significantly raise hybrid unit repair costs, with M-Sport-Ford arguing it would no longer be financially viable for the team to continue.
“It is not a request to remove it for what it is, it is a request to remove it because we can’t actually repair and run them at an economic price for M-Sport. We are talking a few extra million euro to do it and that is not something we can deal with,” M-Sport team principal Richard Millener told Motorsport.com at last month’s Central European Rally.
Rich Millener, Team principal M-Sport Ford Rally
Photo by: M-Sport
Speaking at last month’s penultimate round of the championship, Toyota and Hyundai bosses both admitted they would support measures to remove hybrid if it meant it would ensure the current level of participants for the future.
“We will never actively or proactively request to remove the hybrid from WRC. Having said that, we also need to be pragmatic and recognise the fact that the WRC community is a small community, and as any small community, we need to look after one another,” said Hyundai’s team principal Cyril Abiteboul.
“So if there are any steps that must be taken in order to guarantee participants and competitors at the events we will accept to take those steps.”
Toyota’s Jari-Matti Latvala added: “Performance-wise, the cars are pretty good even without it. But it shouldn’t get too difficult for the teams, and if there is a risk that teams cannot be in the World Rally Championship because they are running out of units, then it shouldn’t be that way.”
