San Remo prepares for its rally: as many as 250 crews
San Remo prepares for its rally
The math is in. Nearly 250 crews will be in Sanremo over the weekend of Oct. 17-20 for the 71° Rallye Sanremo and of the 39° Sanremo Rally Storico, as well as the 38th Coppa dei Fiori Regularity Rally, Sanremo Eco Rally and the Club Italia rally.
The weekend will begin on Thursday, Oct. 17, with scrutineering for the 71° Rallye Sanremo, a race valid for the Italian Absolute Rally-Sparco Championship, the European Rally Trophy, the Zone-2 Rally Cup, as well as the branded trophies, Michelin Trofeo Italia, Trofeo Accademia Pirelli, Toyota’s GR Yaris Rally Cup and Suzuki Rally Cup, which will light up the special stages of the hinterland on Friday and Saturday.
There will be 111 crews that will descend the platform of Corso Imperatrice in front of Casinò led by the reconfirmed 2024 Italian champion Andrea Crugnola, flanked by Pietro Elia Ometto, the season’s star performers with their Citroën C3, anxious to win their first victory in the City of Flowers (in his palmares only two second places); Crugnola, who will have to deal with particularly fierce opponents, such as Simone Campedelli and Tania Canton, Škoda Fabia RS, who will start immediately after, then the Toyota GR Yaris of Giandomenico Basso-Lorenzo Granai, winners of the Sanremo 2023 and the only ones to win a race this season.
Although the Italian Absolute Rally Championship è has been awarded it will be interesting to see the fight between the newly crowned champion Marco Signor, with Daniele Michi dictating the pace in his Toyota Yaris, who will have to contend mainly with the very young (23 years old) and talented Roberto Daprà with Luca Guglielmetti at the notes of his Škoda Fabia RS. Speaking of young promises now a realityà to be followed the race of Andrea Mabellini and Virginia Lenzi who with their Škoda Fabia RS have impressed well during the season and the veteran Paolo Andreucci with Rudy Briani on the right seat of the Skoda Fabia RS who è at the 26th presence at the Sanremo having won six of them four consecutive (2015/2018).
The Sanremo è decisive for the awarding of the Two-Wheel Drive title, which will be contested between the Peugeot 208 GT Line Rally4 cars of Giorgio Cogni-Simone Brachi, Gianandrea Pisani-Massimo Moriconi and Christofer Lucchesi-Enrico Bracchi. As the Sanremo is a 1.5 coefficient race, whoever wins in the City of Flowers has a good chance of taking the title home. The Junior è crown is a private affair between Matteo Doretto-Marco Frigo and Francesco De Ceci-Niccolò Lazzarini, with the former clearly the favorite who needs only a handful of points. But as history teaches, titles are won only on the final platform and often beyond.
The 71° Rallye Sanremo è also the fourth and final race of the Zone-2 Rally Cup and it is assumed that there will be a battle among the Lanterna National Final aspirants, to whom Elwis Chentre, Jacopo Araldo, then the winner of the recent Rally delle Palme, the Under 25 Federico Gangi, Federico Santini and Massimo Marasso are aiming, with the Genoese Francesco Aragno to upset the cards. Also looking at the CRZ is Sanremo’s Patrizia Sciascia, with Roberto Lollo to navigate her in the Škoda Fabia RS, who will also aim for success in the women’s field having to face Rachele Somaschini and Arianna Doriguzzi Breatta.
In addition to the’fiery modern tricolor race the roads of the Ligurian hinterland will be faced on Saturday 19 and Sunday 20 also by the historic cars of the 39° Sanremo Rally Storico, 45 of which are entered in the FIA European Historic Championship and 36 Italian Historic Car Rally Championship, followed by the equally historic cars of the 38th Coppa dei Fiori Regularityà a media, which will be joined by the two protagonists of the’Eco Rally and the dozen dream cars of the Club Italia rally.
In short, for four days San Remo and the roads of the Imperia hinterland will be the center of attention of modern and historic road racing fans.
Last year it wentò as follows: 70° Rallye Sanremo (September 29-30, 2023) 1. Giandomenico Basso-Lorenzo Granai (Škoda Fabia Rally2 evo) in 1.10’35”5; 2 Boštjan Avbelj-Damijan Andrejka (Škoda Fabia Rally2 evo) at 47”3; 3. Nicola Sartor-Lorenzo Mattucci (Škoda Fabia RS Rally2) at 1’24”1.
Last year it went like this: 38° Sanremo Rally Storico (Oct. 8-10) 1. Lucio Da Zanche-Daniele De Luis (Porsche 911 Carrera RS 3.0) in 1.32’42”7; 2. Marty Mc McCormack-Barney Mitchell (BMW M3) at 46”8; 3. Gianfranco Cunico-Luigi Pirollo (Porsche 911 SC RS) at 1’02”2.
