Where's Toyota?

[DreamsofaCobra]

After watching most of Speedvision's coverage of FIA WRC 2001 season, I have seen a conspicious lack of Toyotas. From what I remember, Toyota had a glorious Rally Racing past, with the Celica GT-4 and old Corrolas. Where are they now? Have they given up Rally because of cost, etc? Also, what about Audi? It just seems strange to me, Rally isn't what it used to be, (considering I have been out of the loop since they never show it on anything but speedvision/channel) Don't get me wrong, rally still rules all! And I love the WRX!

[ales]

OK, welcome to the 21st century

Toyota pulled out of rally to concentrate on their Formula 1 effort.

Audi ... never mind

Alex

[CAptynCrunch]

Very true, Toyota have pulled out unfortunatly, but i think the real loss was when Mazda pulled out. Am I the only person who misses having a 4WD, turbo charged Protege? they were the best!

Speaking of which, does anyone know if the 4WD sytem from the Protege GT-X is the same from Mazda's current SUV? Because my cousin has a 91 Protege GT, the non turbo, FWD version of the GT-X and he's trying to find a way to convert to 4wd before he starts putting a lot of power into it(it's currently got about 170HP N/A). So between us all we can come up with is to find an old GT-X, probably motorless or with some form of damage, and haul the 4WD system out of it and putting it into the GT, because they're essentially the exact same car, only with some of the parts missing.

As an alternative I was thinking about teh system in Mazda's current SUV(I can't even remember what it's called, it's jsut tehy're version of say the RAV4). Anyone know anything about this? could it be done?

[Ssom]

Yup- they got in shit over the GT4 some time ago- then after 2000 they witdrew the Corollas and now F1 is thier ground

[NSX]

Originally posted by ales
Audi ... never mind

I read in F1 Racing a couple months ago that Volkswagen is working hard to get a team into F1.

[ales]

The rumour that is vehemently denid by VW (it pops up from time to time, the latest being this week when reports appeared that BMW might start the complete works effort rom 2005 - something I doubt will happen - and Williams would need another engine supplier)

[Guido]

Originally posted by DreamsofaCobra
... It just seems strange to me, Rally isn't what it used to be, (considering I have been out of the loop since they never show it on anything but speedvision/channel) Don't get me wrong, rally still rules all! And I love the WRX!

You bet, only a couple of teams dissapeared, but others are in the game now. Citroen, Huyndai and Skoda to name a few, not that they are top-teams, except for Citroen who will prove very quick in 2003 , but that make up the lot and keep the rally exciting. I've been following Rally since 1985-1986 and as far as competition is concerned, WRC is still as excitnig as it was back then.