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1984 is the year of AUDI's revenge. After the defeats gotten in the season 1983 from LANCIA, also on surfaces favorable to the integral traction, the house of INGOLSTADT introduces itself to the Wolrd Appointment with a great rally team, composed by drivers of the caliber of ROEHRL, MIKKOLA and BLONQVIST and above all with a new car: the SPORT QUATTRO. This car, born at the end of 1980, has been the first rally car to use the integral traction further to a powerful 5 cylinders engine with turbocharger. Initially, the German car had a engine of 2109 cc with a power of about 360 bhp. This model, revolutionary for the rally races, had however a excessive understeer because of the excessive weight (over 1200 Kgs) and of the anterior positioning of the engine. Such inconvenients prejudiced the results of the seasons 1981-1983 for OPEL and LANCIA, real dominators of the mentioned three years. In 1984, however the things seem to change and the Ingolstadt's technicians planned a car denominated SPORT QUATTRO, shorter than the precedent (2204 mm against the 2524) and with a better division of the weights, now distributed to the 55 percent on the anterior and to the 45 percent on the back.
The new German weapon, decidedly more manageable and with an engine brought to 450 bhp, goes to the top of the category, in fact of power and performances. All the others can only look at, inclusive the LANCIA, because his new four wheel drive car, the 038, is not yet ready and the old 037, with only two wheels drive, can no more make miracles.
The champion of the world, at the end of a one-sense season, will be STIG BLONQVIST, a complete and experienced pilot, able still today after twenty years, to surprise with a more sophisticated WRC. The Swedish, thanks to the victories gotten in SWEDEN, ACROPOLIS, NEW ZEALAND, ARGENTINA and IVORY COAST, becomes for the first time World Rally Champion while the team companion HANNU MIKKOLA, Finnish, gets the second place thanks to the victory in PORTUGAL and to the numerous second places end, after the Champion of the World. To the LANCIA only the crumbs and the success gotten by ALEN at the CORSICA RALLY doesn't justify a negative year for the Turinese team. It is necessary to find a solution in a world where the prevailing ground is the gravel and the integral traction the correct way to follow. Of the same opinion is also the PEUGEOT team, that lines up its weapon in Corse. The PEUGEOT 205 T16, entrusted to the experienced hands of VATANEN, it is a real power and technology bomb: aggressive, light, with integral traction, with the turbocharged engine centrally positioned inside the car-body and above all manageable. These qualities will do of the 205 T16, in the following years, the car to defeat. The transalpine team wins the SANREMO RALLY making to glimpse, above all to the AUDI, its superiority.
If the things for the LANCIA goes badly, in a World Championship stingy of successes, it doesn't mean that the 037 is finished; on the contrary! The Turinese car, now evolved in the mechanics and in the engine, wins with CARLO CAPONE the European title, with ADARTICO VUDAFIERI the Italian OPEN, besides numerous successes gotten in Italy from drivers like GIANFRANCO CUNICO, main driver of TAMAUTO TEAM, FABRIZIO TABATON, second in the Italian CIR Rally Championship, GIANNI CAPELLINO, winner of the ZONE ONE Italy Cup and of BERETTA winner of the ZONE TWO. To them the worth to have shown the unbeatability of the 037 where the super budgets of the official teams don't arrive but where only the passion, the heart and the heavy foot count.
Click on the name of each driver to have his image.
| WORLD RALLY MAKES CHAMPIONSHIP |
| POS. |
CAR |
PTS. |
| 1st |
Audi |
120 |
| 2nd |
Lancia |
108 |
| 3rd |
Peugeot |
74 |
| 4th |
Toyota |
62 |
| 5th |
Renault |
55 |
| 6th |
Opel |
48 |
| 7th |
Nissan |
46 |
| 8th |
Volkswagen |
34 |
| 9th |
Subaru |
11 |
| 10th |
Fiat/Alfa |
09 |
|  |
ALEN-KIVIMAKI
Tour de Corse 1984
1st place end
1984 Archive Picture |
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