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What do Petter Solberg, Walter Rohrl and Carlos Sainz have in common? Answer is that their home countries did not host a FIA WRC round at the time they became World Champions.
Rally Norway is a snow rally very close to Rally Sweden both in geographical terms but also in calendar. When WRC calendar went through big upheaval for 2007 season, Norway was included partly because organisers presented significant benefits from concept of pairing the event with Swedish Rally. Main benefits were economical and related to the fact that two similar rallies were to be held in consecutive weekends ie. lower shipping costs per event plus same car with same tyres and set-up could be utilized.
If one thinks that one snow rally is same as the other snow rally, Norway proved that wrong. Route consisted of some very narrow forest tracks, making it slower than Sweden, and roads were lined with deep and treacherous snow banks. These cushion the impacts and consequently there are few retirements due to accident damage but quite many competitors do get stuck for minutes. Nature of the roads is different from Sweden where getting stuck is not such a big issue.
General feeling after the first running of the event at WRC level was that it was not perfect but very good nevertheless. Small route adjustments are needed as competitors disliked the narrow and bumpy sections. Also, there were some problems with results services. Other than these, all went smoothly and rally was a welcome addition to portfolio of WRC events.
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| 2007:
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Hirvonen, Mikko
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Ford Focus RS WRC 06
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102.55 km/h
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| 2009:
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Loeb, Sebastien
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Citroen C4 WRC
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103.97 km/h
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At places, route is very narrow and bumpy.
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Snow is plentiful and an off means getting stuck in the snow for minutes. Visibility drops severely when its snowing as in this picture.
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In 2007, service for WRC teams was located inside unique Viking Ship stadium, originally built for 1994 Winter Olympics and reminding boat turned upside down.
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Driver wins
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Hirvonen, Mikko (1)
Loeb, Sebastien (1)
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Manufacturer wins
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Citroen (1)
Ford (1)
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