Well done MSA

In my 64th year, 48 years of that as a motor club member, competitor, marshal, spectator area organiser and a perennial critic of the MSA, I have never read such a load of tripe coming from our rule makers as the Category 1 situation. That latest nail driven into our sport is typical of the dreary drip, drip of rule changes that is killing rallying, when the true cause is much nearer home.

The MSA may pronounce its spiritual commitment to rallying but the real truth is that they are the sport’s policemen, not there to be at the heart of its cultivation, but to govern it with an iron hand on behalf of the Government. With costs spiralling, and no help from their vast contingency fund (derived from our licence fees), there is a continuous stream of rule changes mounting cost on cost, which is gradually destroying clubs and competitors.

And thereby we see the real problem for Category 1. It doesn’t matter whether the ton of metal is off number 1 or 121, because the real danger comes from having too few marshals. And the reason for that is clubs are weakening, year on year, for the reasons above.

My experience of competing and marshalling tells me that slow cars first warn the unprepared better than a WRC car in the hands of a driver that isn’t WRC!

I wonder how many more will turn their backs on the sport in 2016, when faced with the cost of new HANS devices and helmets, on top of seat, seat belt, rollcages etc.

The MSA’S licence track record reflects their guardianship and tells us the future, if nothing changes. Jeff Ledger Durham