Q&A

[QUOTE=GT500]First of all, I want to congratulate you on your new Rally Navigation section. It's really something that never really seemed to be so important in Rally racing. Your new section alerts everyone about how complicated this is, and it really brought me around! Great job Matra!

Second, I want to ask you a quick question. Why do rally cars have navigators instead of GPS systems (handheld, if they crash their brand new DVD-based navi is gone! ) or why don't they have helicopters flying overhead telling them where to turn and stuff? (heh....cost might be an issue )It seems much more relable. Is the navigation such a big part of the sport as is the driving?

Thanks for your time, your answer would be much appreciated.
-GT500[/QUOTE]

Thanks :)

Couple of things....

First major international and especially WRC do NOT include these plot'n'bas challenges anymore.
They are a set of closed stages with recce to write your pace notes and road-book to go between.

navigational events are BANNED from using navigational aids like GPS.
Caught and your DQ'ed. ( What they're going to do about next gen mobiles with GPS built-in will be interesting :)
I'd hate to see the day a NAV was replaced with an in-car GPS sat-nav calling out the corners - assuming they could get the signal through wet Scottish forests :)

As a challenge to the driver and the navigator the rules for different types of events are written to constrain the external aid the nav can receive.

An exception is things like Dakar where spotter heli's are permitted to warn of impending dangers.

Navigation - even with pace notes - is THE major part of the competition.
A driver can make a mistake and lose a few seconds on a corner, a nav makes a mistake and it can be minutes and in the case of navigation tests like these we're trying here it can mean DQ if over 30 minutes lost time in total !!

Of course drivers usually sum it up as " co-drivers cannot win rallies, they can only lose them for a driver" :)

As well as providing direction the nav typically is th4e organiser for small teams who can't afford the expense of team managers etc etc.

As everyone starts out at the bottom, learning these skills are also important and I'll find the time to share some of those pearls in the future.

I'm sure more aids will start to enter competition as for example 2-way radios, but we'll always have the club end of the sport partaking in pot'n'bash like these here and enjoying the compnaionship and the food/beer on completion when awaiting results being published :)