New Regulations
08. December 2008A good two months ago the members of the Truck Racing Commission met in Paris. In addition to the fixing of the racing dates for 2009 they also presented some changes in the regulations and submitted them to the FIA World Sport Council (WSC) for their approval. The WSC’s decision-making meeting took place 4 weeks ago. The calendar is by now official; with regard to the rule changes there were no further statements. Upon request we were only told that we should await the written acknowledgement on the part of the FIA – but they weren’t heard from again. The latest statement on the FIA website regarding the truck racing regulations dates from April 1st, 2008. This means that all information with regard to possible changes in the regulations is solely based on the facts published by those people who were present at the meeting of the Truck Racing Commission.
As before, a racing weekend begins with two free practices of 20 minutes each, and on the subsequent racing days with the warm-up. Then it gets serious with the respective timed practices, where the starting grid for the first race is set. This race will already be 45 kilometres long – instead of 30 km, as before. And, same as previously in the Championship Race, the winner gets 20 points, the runner-up 15, the second runner-up gets 12 points and so on down to the pilot on 10th place with 1 point. And now there is the crucial alteration, where the decision-makers took their cue from the WTCC’s (World Touring Car Championship) successful regulations. The pilots finishing in the positions 1 to 8 in the first race will now start the second race in reverse order.
The eighth-place finisher will be pole setter, the winner will be eighth on the grid. From the ninth place on the pilots will start according to the finish in the previous race. For the second race the distance will also be 45 km, but nevertheless, in this race only half the number of points can be achieved – 10 points for the winner, 9 for the runner-up and so on with lastly 1 point for the pilot on tenth.
So far, there is no information available about the future handling of the victory ceremony. Is there a ceremony after each race, or only after the first one, which evidently – for whatever reasons – is rated as higher-value, or is the overall score of the day decisive?
Why there should be given only half of the points for the second race, compared to the points for the first one, is inexplicable.
So far this points system (from 10 to 1) was only used for the Qualifying Races. But in these cases there was a reduced distance of 30 km only and these regulations can be traced back to the time, when the drivers actually had to qualify for the main race – the former Cup Race, lately renamed Championship Race. Back then there were often more RaceTrucks registered then some of the circuits allowed for one race. For the last time this was the case in 2005, when up to 40 RaceTruck pilots were at the start. In 2006 there were once again ‘true’ Qualy races at the Truck-Grand-Prix on the Nürburgring, however, in that year the TGP did not count among the FIA races.
After 2005, the year when the number of registrations got a bit out of hand – 56 drivers were registered for the championship, but often participated only in three or for of the races at the most – the FIA limited the number of pilots for the championship to 26. Since that time the “Qualifying Race”, as it was officially called, was technically obsolete in its original function. Because of its name there were even some misunderstandings several times, as some organizers called the Timed Practice “Qualifying”, too.
