The Monte Carlo Rally or Rallye Monte-Carlo, officially Rallye Automobile de Monte-Carlo, in modern days abbreviated to RMC, is a rallying event organised each year by the Automobile Club de Monaco which also organises the Formula One Monaco Grand Prix and the Rallye Monte-Carlo Historique.
The rally now takes place along the French Riviera in the Principality of Monaco and southeast France. Previously, competitors would set off from all four corners of Europe and rally, in other words, meet, in Monaco to celebrate the end of a unique event.
From its inception in 1911 by Prince Albert I it was an important means of demonstrating improvements and innovations to automobiles, as well as promoting Monaco as an important tourist resort on the Mediterranean shore. More and more people became owners of motor cars and touring at home and abroad with a car was becoming an important way of recreation in the first decades of the 20th century.
In 1909 the Automobile Club de Monaco (Sport Automobile Velocipédique Monégasque) started planning a car rally at the behest of Albert I, Prince of Monaco. The Monte Carlo Rally was to start at points all over Europe and converge on Monte Carlo.
More information: ACM
In January 1911, 21, 23 cars set out from 11 different locations and Henri Rougier was among the nine who left Paris to cover a 1,020 kilometres route. Except for some glazed frost on the road most itineraries were not too bad for January. However, the two participants starting from Vienna did not reach their destination because of temperatures of -18 Celsius and 40cm of iced snow on the roads. The event was won by Rougier in a Turcat-Méry 25 Hp. The rally comprised both driving and then somewhat arbitrary judging based on the elegance of the car, passenger comfort and the condition in which it arrived in the principality. The outcry of scandal when the results were published changed nothing, so Rougier was proclaimed the first winner.
In 1912 the Rallye Automobile de Monte-Carlo attracted 60 actual starters. There were now ten different starting points from where to rally towards the Principality of Monaco, Rallye Automobile Monaco was on their cars plates.
With an average required speed of 25 km/h this meant that the character was mostly touring, and the participants mostly used comfortable closed limousines. As these participants were often affluent owners, it was not uncommon that most of the driving was done by their chauffeurs. The most adventurous new starting city was Saint Petersburg in the Russian Empire, 3.257 km of winter roads away from Monte Carlo.
The period between 1924 and 1939 can be characterized as a difficult and sometimes frustrating search for an event to truly and fairly challenge the competitors and their vehicles. This was particularly hard because of the rapid development of not only the motor cars in that period, but also of the quality of the roads and their maintenance in winter.
It took some time after the Second World War for the organizers -still with Anthony Noghès in charge- to put a new Rally together. Europe changed geographically and politically. New countries, new borders, so Prague was the only possible starting point behind the Iron Curtain. Instead of the rallying to meet near Monte Carlo, now there was a circular route from Monte Carlo to Amsterdam and back.
Skipping 1957 because of the Suez crisis -with fuel rationing and a ban on motor sports events for several months- the next few years witnessed very different winners.
After another petrol crisis, following the Yom Kippur war, as a result of the stop of crude oil exports to Europe the 1974 edition was cancelled.
These years the first four-wheel-drive cars appeared. Allowed form 1979, in fact the Audi Quattro was the first to be entered in 1981, but it took some years to become successful. Combined with the arrival of Group B regulations from 1982, 200 cars to be built with vast freedom in design and almost unlimited power with turbo engines developed and allowed, this made rally cars incredibly fast. And incredibly hard to drive.
One of the most remarkable facts over the last twenty some years is that just three drivers won 18 out of the 24 events. Tommi Mäkinen four times in a row and later Sébastien Loeb and Sébastien Ogier seven times each!
More information: WRC
which is an event I really enjoy.
Sébastien Loeb
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