Super 2000 World Rally Championship

Super 2000 World Rally Championship
CategoryRallying
CountryInternational
Inaugural season2010
Folded2012
Classes
Last Drivers' championRepublic of Ireland Craig Breen
Last Co-Drivers' championSweden Emil Axelsson
World Rally
Championship
 
Current season
Support categories
Current car classes
Related lists

The FIA Super 2000 World Rally Championship (also SWRC) was a support championship of the World Rally Championship (WRC) that ran for three seasons from 2010 to 2012.[1]

It was introduced to provide a series for the Super 2000 (S2000) specification of rally car, which in performance terms sat above the Group N level production cars and its Production World Rally Championship (PWRC), and the World Rally Car that dominated overall WRC results. Between 2007 and 2009, Super 2000 cars were permitted in the PWRC alongside Group N, with a noticeable gap in performance between the two. The creation of SWRC returned PWRC to a production car only series. SWRC also provided an FIA alternative to the Intercontinental Rally Challenge, which had gained in popularity and may have been a commercial threat to the WRC.[2][3]

SWRC was replaced by the then new WRC2 Championship in 2013, after the Super 2000 cars were replaced by the FIA with Group R cars, specifically the R5.[4][5]

For one season only in 2010, there was also a WRC Cup for Teams which was only for Super 2000 cars. However, this cup was not part of the Super 2000 championship even though many of the crews driving for the teams were.[6] This may be attributed to the way the cup and championship were approved by and proposed to the World Motor Sport Council separately.[3] With the new World Rally Car being based on Super 2000 rules, there was no strictly Super 2000 based cup or championship for teams in the following years as this was incorporated into the World Rally Championship.[7]

  1. ^ "Motorsport Winners". motorsportwinners.com. Retrieved 2023-02-04.
  2. ^ Panzariu, Ovidiu (2009-12-03). "FIA to Create Special Series for S2000 Cars in the WRC". autoevolution. Retrieved 2023-02-03.
  3. ^ a b Patterson, Doug (2009-12-03). "Rally – New Super 2000 Class for WRC". OpenPaddock.net. Retrieved 2023-02-04.
  4. ^ Patterson, Doug (2012-09-29). "Rally – Exciting Changes in WRC for 2013". OpenPaddock.net. Retrieved 2023-02-04.
  5. ^ "Skoda Announces Fabia R5 to Replace Fabia S2000 Rally Car :: News :: autoviva.com". www.autoviva.com. Retrieved 2023-02-04.
  6. ^ Engineering, Racecar (2009-12-12). "WRC 2010: S2000". Racecar Engineering. Retrieved 2023-02-04.
  7. ^ "World Rally Championship - News - FIA". 2009-07-21. Archived from the original on 2009-07-21. Retrieved 2023-02-04.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link)