mals suggestion is one that I know a lot of competitors think is the 'right' way to do it
and the question of penalizing one event vs. another ? it is not penalizing anyone, something has to give. I would say you are letting them off easy, they are already penalized having to put on an event (sarcasm). sorry to say but that is a better problem than having no competitors. you think it is bad in ab ? how would quebec fare with 5 to choose from ? most competitors from out east think the bighorn/rocky thing is a bit silly anyhow and that the forces should be combined. of course, they dont live in that region and understand the situation etc. I am just the messenger. one could argue the international quebec vs. charlevoix is another example. It is rampant in all regions. that is why...
the most talked about and most sane suggestions I have heard sort of go like this:
one event per region for national, selected by the region, with approval from board (i.e. so no lame rallies get in) - region is free to rotate if region so chooses but board has to approve the recommendation
atlantic would be covered by Baie (it really is in the atlantic region, culturally and location-wise and otherwise)
and quebec would get one national to nominate out of perce, defi, quebec, charlevoix (or anything else)
and international events would not count for national series (so it becomes defi or perce), and this is an 'out' for a region that thinks it can support 2 big rallies. If you think you deserve it, then upgrade one to intl status. Hows that for aggressive ?
and ab would get one national
and on would get one
and bc would get one
with the caveat that regions with 'events to spare' could host backup events in the case of a region losing its national event due to loss of oevent or (worse, but a good incentive) lack of ability to host national calibre events.
guess what - 5 events, events in regions would then be incented to WORK together, you wouldn't have this problem of over expensive internationals in the national champ, you would have a reasonable number of events in the series, and regions which cant face up to the fact that one rally is better than another can rotate if they cant handle the politics, and the REGIONS will decide which event will be their national, but they still have to put on a good event
lets face some facts (this will piss people off but it is true and I am not afraid to say it):
some rallies in the national championship are just not operating on the same level as others
nine events is too many for everyone that I have talked to
the above system seems fair but still allows for the raw fact that quebec can support more rallies and thus there will be more there than elsewhere, but right now you have 2 internationals which wouldn't count, so the only loss would be PN if you took in defi
you could (and probably should) even do the above system with quebec getting to nominate 2 due to their 'special status' in rally in canada (this would make good politics as well with rsq). But probably not needed. if you did do it, one of them would be a 'drop' event (i.e. you couldn't count both unless you did an event in all regions). so then you would have 6. Some other regions with 2 rallies (actually, there is only one) might cry "not fair", but the reality is, the market is there to support it and the rally has a unique character.
We need this type of system to FORCE rallies to be accountable since no one else is seeming to do so.
And if you had good enough reason, you could also make this 2 per region thing also in ON due to pop base excuse. So at most you would have 7, worst case you would have 5 (best is probably 6). You can enter the internationals at your own leisure/dollar. They are part of CNAR/RSNA anyhow. This would also place more emphasis on the regional championships in the regions, with each region's 'national' being the time to go fight the big boys. And I would say, ditch the 'enforcement' rules about cross regions. Some people just plain cant afford it, dont rub it in. Or else make it 'must run in 4 regions', if you want to count 2 in one region must start in all 5.
I dont know, but honestly, this is not my idea but something i read somewhere in some sort of plan i read when I started rallying, have heard discussed by a lot of the people who now cannot afford to do it (sprongl, townsend, latreille, vincent, etc.). it seems to have disappered somehow. a lot of people that actually OWN and RUN cars in the NATIONAL series not just THINKING ABOUT MAYBE DOING IT SOMEDAY and not just fighting for their own REGIONAL INTEREST because they cant afford to go national, think this.
currently It is too much. They do it anyway because they love the sport and dont want the series to die. But will they be able to do it tomorrow ? they dont say it here because you will all jump on them. Well, I am in the unique position of sort of being on the sidelines. if we dont do something we will not have much left.
The time has come to address the issue without letting political correctness get in the way. Of course, I say this as I am totally happy that my home region finally has a rally. As you can see, it is not so easy.
-pat