The FIA World Rally Championship 2020 season has been severely impacted by the Covid-19 worldwide pandemic that has led to the necessary cancelation of five rallies and further postponement of another two. Last week FIA WRC Managing Director Oliver Ciesla confirmed that the WRC is in search of a unique solution for this season by possibly including rallies that have proved themselves in the international arena. Amongst those is Rally Liepāja. Since it was first run in 2013 Rally Liepāja has been highly regarded by the FIA European Rally Championship (ERC) promoter Eurosport Events, FIA and competitors. It is scheduled to host the second event of the 2020 FIA ERC season from August 14-16.

“RA Events and WRC Promoter held the first round of talks on Monday, where we discussed multiple organisational aspects, terms and conditions, and many other topics that need to be covered for Latvia to host a FIA World Rally Championship round alongside a round of the FIA ERC. I want to emphasize that this is just a first round of talks and neither of the parties are close to the final decisions on this matter,” said RA Events director, Raimonds Strokšs.

“This will be a very challenging task as there is less than two months until the set event date. We will invite our partners – the Government of Latvia, our rally cities Liepāja and Talsi – to a discussion, in order to evaluate all the organisational workload, financial conditions and other aspects of the proposal. Only by working together and at a very rapid pace, can we find a solution to host a FIA WRC round in Latvia alongside the FIA ERC,” concluded Strokšs.

Should agreement be reached to host a FIA WRC round in Latvia, discussions will then be concluded with Eurosport Events as to how a combined event would be managed in the best interests of the ERC and its drivers and teams, many of whom have competed on Rally Liepāja from the outset. Eurosport Events is a founding partner of Rally Liepāja and a key component of the event’s ongoing success and the terms of its agreement will be honoured at all times.

Regardless of the result of above discussions, and as it has been previously stated, Rally Liepāja will retain its place in the 2020 FIA European Rally Championship. Running of the event is scheduled for August 14-16, 2020.

News and other information about Rally Liepāja can be found on the official website at www.lvrally.com, as well as on social media Twitter @LVRally, Facebook /LVRally, draugiem.lv /lvrally, YouTube /RallyLiepāja and Instagram /lvrally.

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More information: Jānis Unbedahts, RA EVENTS, +371 26557801, janis@raevents.lv