WRC EKO Acropolis Rally Greece

A legendary WRC fixture. Twisty gravel mountain roads combine with high temperatures and choking dust to provide a fierce challenge. The tracks are smoother than they used to be but still pose punishing demands on tyres and cars.   

Challenge

• Hard base roads and high temperatures require careful management of tyres and cars.
• Conditions are especially tricky on repeated stages, when rocks and bedrock unearthed during the first pass can be especially damaging.
• Avoid mechanical issues. An opening leg with no service and long morning and afternoon sections on Saturday mean technical troubles will be severely punished.

Car spec

• Gravel suspension.
• Additional protection can be fitted to shield cars from the punishing roads.
• Drivers can raise the ride height to guard against rock-strewn roads during the second pass of stages.
• Pirelli’s hard compound Scorpion tyres will be the template choice, but soft compound rubber is also available. Each Rally1 crew will have a maximum of 28 tyres for the event, including shakedown.

Servicepark

Located at the National Trade Fair in Lamia in central Greece, 220km north of Athens.

History

• The Acropolis Rally was first held in 1953 and was a founding member of the FIA World Rally Championship in 1973. In the 1970s it regularly comprised more than 50 stages and 850 competitive kilometres.
• Apart from 1974, when it was cancelled due to an oil crisis, and 1995, when it was an FIA Two-Litre Cup round only, it remained in the series until 2010. It returned in 2011 but was dropped from the WRC at the end of 2013, after which it became a European Championship round.
• In 2005 the Acropolis was named Rally of the Year following a hugely successful super special stage in a packed Olympic Stadium in Athens.
• Colin McRae is the Acropolis master with five wins between 1996 and 2002. He won twice in a Subaru Impreza before a hat-trick of wins from 2000 in a Ford Focus.
• Other winners include former world champions Walter Röhrl, Björn Waldegård, Ari Vatanen, Miki Biasion, Juha Kankkunen, Carlos Sainz and Sébastien Loeb.
• Ford tops the manufacturers’ roll of honour with 13 wins.