1997 World Rally Championship Season
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1997 World Rally Championship Season
The 1997 World Rally Championship was the 25th season of the FIA World Rally Championship. The season saw many changes in the championship. Most notably, Group A was partially replaced by the World Rally Car with manufacturers given the option which regulations to construct to. One inherent benefit to manufacturers by adopting WRC regulations was removing the need to mass-produce road-going versions of the cars that they competed with, under the previous rules for homologation. This meant that vehicles such as the Escort RS Cosworth and Subaru Impreza Turbo no longer had to be mass-produced for general sale in order to compete at World Championship level, and thus acting as a means of attracting increased competition and involvement by manufacturers. In the few years that follow, the Championship saw the added presence of WRC cars from companies such as Hyundai, Seat, Citroën, and Peugeot, who would all compete under WRC regulations without having to manufacture equivalent speci ...
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World Rally Championship
The World Rally Championship (abbreviated as WRC) is the highest level of global competition in the motorsport discipline of rallying, owned and governed by the FIA. There are separate championships for drivers, co-drivers, manufacturers and teams. The series currently consists of 13 three to four-day rally events driven on surfaces ranging from gravel and tarmac to snow and ice. Each rally is usually split into 15–25 special stages which are run against the clock on up to 350 kilometres of closed roads. Drivers Sébastien Loeb, Sébastien Ogier, Juha Kankkunen, Tommi Mäkinen and Colin McRae all became WRC champions. Other drivers who became well known primarily through their WRC careers include Michèle Mouton, Henri Toivonen, Jari-Matti Latvala and Mikko Hirvonen. Rallies that have frequently appeared in the championship have included Monte Carlo Rally, Tour de Corse, Sanremo, Acropolis, Safari Rally, and national rallies of Great Britain, Finland, New Zealand, Au ...
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Colin McRae
Colin Steele McRae, (5 August 1968 – 15 September 2007) was a Scottish rally driver. He was the 1991 and 1992 British Rally Champion, and in 1995 became the first British driver and the youngest person to win the World Rally Championship Drivers' title, a record which stood for 27 years until Kalle Rovanperä took the 2022 season title just a day after his 22nd birthday. McRae's performances with the Subaru World Rally Team enabled the team to win the World Rally Championship Manufacturers' title three times in succession in 1995, 1996 and 1997. After four years with the Ford Motor Co. team, where McRae won nine events, he moved to Citroën World Rally Team in 2003 where, despite not winning an event, he helped them win their first manufacturers' title. He was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire for services to motorsport in 1996. With 25 victories in the WRC, McRae held the record for the most wins in the series from 2002 to 2004, when Carlos Sainz ...
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Oceania
Oceania (, , ) is a region, geographical region that includes Australasia, Melanesia, Micronesia, and Polynesia. Spanning the Eastern Hemisphere, Eastern and Western Hemisphere, Western hemispheres, Oceania is estimated to have a land area of and a population of around 44.5 million as of 2021. When compared with (and sometimes described as being one of) the continents, the region of Oceania is the smallest in land area and the list of continents and continental subregions by population, second least populated after Antarctica. Its major population centres are Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth, Auckland, Adelaide, Honolulu, and Christchurch. Oceania has a diverse mix of economies from the developed country, highly developed and globally competitive market economy, financial markets of Australia, French Polynesia, Hawaii, Hawaii, New Caledonia, and New Zealand, which rank high in quality of life and Human Development Index, to the much least developed countries, less developed ...
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South America
South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere at the northern tip of the continent. It can also be described as the southern subregion of a single continent called America. South America is bordered on the west by the Pacific Ocean and on the north and east by the Atlantic Ocean; North America and the Caribbean Sea lie to the northwest. The continent generally includes twelve sovereign states: Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Guyana, Paraguay, Peru, Suriname, Uruguay, and Venezuela; two dependent territories: the Falkland Islands and South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands; and one internal territory: French Guiana. In addition, the ABC islands of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, Ascension Island (dependency of Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha, a British Overseas Territory), Bouvet Island ( dependency of Norway), Pa ...
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Asia
Asia (, ) is one of the world's most notable geographical regions, which is either considered a continent in its own right or a subcontinent of Eurasia, which shares the continental landmass of Afro-Eurasia with Africa. Asia covers an area of , about 30% of Earth's total land area and 8.7% of Earth's total surface area. The continent, which has long been home to the majority of the human population, was the site of many of the first civilizations. Its 4.7 billion people constitute roughly 60% of the world's population. In general terms, Asia is bounded on the east by the Pacific Ocean, on the south by the Indian Ocean, and on the north by the Arctic Ocean. The border of Asia with Europe is a historical and cultural construct, as there is no clear physical and geographical separation between them. It is somewhat arbitrary and has moved since its first conception in classical antiquity. The division of Eurasia into two continents reflects East–West cultural, linguistic, ...
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Africa
Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area and 20% of its land area.Sayre, April Pulley (1999), ''Africa'', Twenty-First Century Books. . With billion people as of , it accounts for about of the world's human population. Africa's population is the youngest amongst all the continents; the median age in 2012 was 19.7, when the worldwide median age was 30.4. Despite a wide range of natural resources, Africa is the least wealthy continent per capita and second-least wealthy by total wealth, behind Oceania. Scholars have attributed this to different factors including geography, climate, tribalism, colonialism, the Cold War, neocolonialism, lack of democracy, and corruption. Despite this low concentration of wealth, recent economic expansion and the large and young population make Afr ...
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Europe
Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a Continent#Subcontinents, subcontinent of Eurasia and it is located entirely in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere. Comprising the westernmost peninsulas of Eurasia, it shares the continental landmass of Afro-Eurasia with both Africa and Asia. It is bordered by the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south and Asia to the east. Europe is commonly considered to be Boundaries between the continents of Earth#Asia and Europe, separated from Asia by the drainage divide, watershed of the Ural Mountains, the Ural (river), Ural River, the Caspian Sea, the Greater Caucasus, the Black Sea and the waterways of the Turkish Straits. "Europe" (pp. 68–69); "Asia" (pp. 90–91): "A commonly accepted division between Asia and E ...
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Peugeot 306 Maxi
The Peugeot 306 is a small family car built by the French car manufacturer Peugeot from 1993 to 2002. It replaced the 309. Peugeot gave the 306 many updates and aesthetic changes to keep up with the competition, and it was replaced by the 307 in 2001. Cabriolet and estate versions continued until 2002. Versions were built in Argentina by Sevel from 1996 to 2002. Background The 306 was developed between 1990 and 1992 for a launch at the beginning of 1993. It was a replacement for the Peugeot 309 (which had broken with Peugeot's normal ascending numbering system partly due to it being released before the older and larger Peugeot 305 was axed). Concept versions of the 306 were first seen around the end of 1990, although the motoring press initially reported that it was going to replace the smaller 205. However, by the end of 1991, Peugeot had confirmed that the new car was going to replace the 309, as well as some versions of the 205, which was going to remain in production for s ...
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Gilles Panizzi
Gilles Panizzi (born 19 September 1965) is a former French rally driver. Panizzi was born in Roquebrune-Cap-Martin, Alpes-Maritimes. Like many of his fellow rally racing countrymen, Panizzi spent a great deal of his developmental driving years participating in asphalt rally events throughout his native land. In 1996 and 1997, Panizzi won the French Championship title in a Peugeot-backed (funded) 306 kit car. It was at that point that he was nominated to drive for Peugeot as their resident asphalt (tarmac/sealed-surface) expert. Between 1999 and 2003 Panizzi had great success in his role as Peugeot's tarmac expert. He won a total of seven World Rally Championship rounds in this period - all on tarmac. However, Panizzi's inability to match his rivals pace on gravel, mud, and snow precluded him from challenging for the world title while at Peugeot. Panizzi had an embarrassing moment during the 2000 Safari Rally, where he and his brother and co-driver Herve were behind the slowe ...
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Tour De Corse
The Tour de Corse is a rally first held in 1956 on the island of Corsica. It was the French round of the World Rally Championship from the inaugural 1973 season until 2008, was part of the Intercontinental Rally Challenge from 2011 to 2012, and finally returned to WRC in 2015. The name "Tour de Corse" refers to the fact that in the early days it was run around the island; nowadays it only features roads around Ajaccio. The rally is held on asphalt roads, and is known as the "Ten Thousand Turns Rally" because of the twisty mountain roads. Several drivers have been killed during the event, including fatalities at 3 consecutive events. Attilio Bettega, driving a Lancia 037 Rally, died during the fourth special stage of the 1985 rally, ''Zérubia-Santa Giulia''. On May 2 1986, exactly a year later, Henri Toivonen and his co-driver Sergio Cresto died in their Lancia Delta S4 during the 18th stage of the event, ''Corte-Taverna''. Almost a year later in 1987, co-driver French Corsi ...
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Rallye Catalunya
The Rally Catalunya (formerly: Rallye Catalunya) is a rally competition held in Catalonia region of Spain, on the World Rally Championship schedule. Now held on the wide, smooth and sweeping asphalt roads around the town of Salou, Costa Daurada, it was previously held around the region of Costa Brava. In the 2012 season, the rally was held 8–11 November. Rally de Catalunya was first held in 1957; in 1988 it was merged with the Rally Costa Brava and renamed as ''Rally Catalunya – Costa Brava''. Winners since 1988 Multiple winners † — The 1994 rally only counted for the 2-Litre World Cup. References External links Official site Catalunya Recurring sporting events established in 1988 Catalunya Catalonia (; ca, Catalunya ; Aranese Occitan: ''Catalonha'' ; es, Cataluña ) is an autonomous community of Spain, designated as a ''nationality'' by its Statute of Autonomy. Most of the territory (except the Val d'Aran) lies on the north ...

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FIA 2-Litre World Rally Cup
The ''FIA 2-Litre World Rally Cup'' was a sub-section of the World Rally Championship from 1993 to 1999. It involved mostly or , naturally aspirated, front wheel drive cars. The series was discontinued due to high costs, and the new Super 2000 class was amalgamated into the Production World Rally Championship, whilst the 1600cc cars were generally modified for usage in the Super 1600 class, which formed the basis of the Junior World Rally Championship in 2001. The most successful manufacturer was SEAT, who won the title three times in a row with their SEAT Ibiza Kit Car. As the 1990s progressed the 2 litre cars proved to be exceptional tarmac rally cars. With more engine freedoms and lighter weights they could match, even beat the turbo 4WD Group A and WRC cars. In particular the kit cars built by the French manufacturers Peugeot and Citroën would prove real threats on the Tour de Corse each year as increasingly they become more like circuit racing cars and less like all-terrai ...
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