Following the fourth edition of Croatia Rally to count for the FIA World Rally Championship (18-21 April), Daniel Šaškin, the Organising Committee President, looks back on round four of the 2024 WRC season in Zagreb.
The fourth running of Croatia Rally as a round of the WRC looked like a success, did it feel that way to you and the team?
“More or less. We’re still learning but all my guys are doing an amazing job. Of course we can improve in some parts but with these budgets it’s quite okay what we’re doing. We still have something up our sleeves, but we don’t want to show everything at once.”
In terms of tickets sold and fans on the stages, how pleased were you with the support for the rally from the public?
“The police said there was almost 450,000 people altogether. On the Wolf Power Stage alone we had 90,000 people this year. Of course it’s also the geographic position of Croatia, the good connection with roads and we’re not that expensive still. Within 500 kilometres or 600 kilometres of Zagreb we have almost 100 million people living. We have a lot of Hungarian, Czech, Slovenian visitors as well as Croatian fans. We had a lot of Italians visiting this year, Austrians, Germans – but we also had Japanese fans, we saw Canadian flags on the stages, USA flags, flags from South America. People are coming from all over the world.”
You had the event app again this year with the opportunity to feed back to you as the organisers – how much is that teaching you about the fans who come to Croatia Rally?
“We were a little bit late with the app. It went out in the rally week when it should have been two-three weeks before so that the people can plan where they want to go and everything. But we used the questionnaire when you download the app so we can make a study with the economic faculty in order to get a better picture of who is coming, for how long, where they are staying and how much they spend. And this year already we can say with confidence that €155 million was spent in Croatia around the rally. It’s very important as a tool.”
The volunteers are a big part of any rally, are their numbers increasing each year?
“We still have a lot of people calling who want to be part of the event, but we have to do a selection. So we could use more people because the number of spectators is growing but we don’t have any problem from them. I’d say 99.9 per cent take away their own trash, we don’t have a lot of drunk people ruining the rally, so it looks fantastic and the numbers are huge. We have almost 200 police working with us and around 2,000 people in total working on the event.”
What did the teams have to say about the route and its challenges this year?
“Their tactics were much more difficult. Sébastien Ogier told me that he doesn’t remember a rally when he spent so much time out on the road and not in the service area, which means that the fans are getting to see the cars more and that the cars are being seen by more people. If the FIA will allow remote services next year maybe the teams don’t need to spend so much money on a big central presence and can look at more affordable mobile facilities.”
There was no central service on the opening day. What was the feedback from teams?
“It was okay for the drivers and teams that didn’t have problems but those who couldn’t repair their cars maybe had a problem! Certainly in my time as a rally driver I wouldn’t be thrilled about it but it’s important to show as much of Croatia as we can for the tourism board and the government. The Tyre Fitting Zone, the regroups and almost everywhere that the cars were standing was all very popular with the fans for sure. Thousands of people came out to see the cars and get an autograph if they can. So we are showing as much of Croatia as possible.”
An awful lot rides on how the teams understand the different surfaces, temperatures and conditions. That challenge really makes a team effort important doesn’t it?
“They will always struggle and it’s impossible to have a completely right tactic. You can hear the teams still not managing to understand when there is grip and when there is not. They are still learning but they are becoming very, very fast all the same. When it works for them, all of the crews can do great things. Look at M-Sport’s Adrien Fourmaux taking a stage win on merit, being able to show his talent. So while this year we had the three leaders all strong on every stage – or almost every stage – their advantage wasn’t so big to anyone in the field.”
Is there a wish list of what you would like to do for the next Croatia Rally?
“We certainly have a wish list. From my own position, when I was a driver, I loved competing on night stages. The rally was starting at 06h00 and going through to 03h00 and that was really something special. It’s something important in planning a rally to show who is the toughest. The idea is that we are a small country, a small market, but we can create a rally that feels big and is tough to win. I stood on the ramp for the first car to the last to congratulate the crews for reaching the finish here in Croatia. I asked them what they thought and when they come to the end they have struggled. You sweat but it is an achievement to reach the finish. Next year we are thinking to give every car that finishes a medal like in Dakar because it is a really big challenge to finish here. This is the toughest rally in the world for co-drivers in my view. They have the thickest pacenote book and a lot of work here.”
And are there any definite plans for next year in terms of changes?
“The Power Stage is becoming iconic and I think for sure will always be where it is. There is a big pressure from other places in Croatia who want the rally to visit their area, but if you ask me the most historically important area for motorsport in this country is around Platak: we have been racing there since 1902, despite wars and whatever, so I think we belong there. It’s 99 per cent sure that we will stay in Zagreb with the strong support we enjoy from the city. If we could have remote service areas we might be able to go further across Croatia and the value of that is potentially huge. Croatian people now think more about motorsport and we see a lot more kids wanting to take part in karts and so on, so we want to continue to grow the sport nationally.”
