For the second consecutive year and for the sixth time in its 42-year history, the Argentine Rally Championship is preparing to start its 2023 season competing on the Buenos Aires plain and with the city of General Madariaga as host of the Pagos del Tuyú Rally, which in language Aboriginal means “Soft Mud”.
The test will take place on Friday from 1:30 p.m. on its shakedown in a segment of 4.76 kilometers to give the first reference of the year for the 60 pairings scored.
There will be several rookies in the senior class and the absence of the champion, Marcos Ligato from Cordoba, who has already announced that he will run some tests this year thinking regarding Codasur and the world date in Chile next September. Something similar will happen with Federico Villagra, the other multiple Cordovan champion, who is defining his participation in the year even though he is registered in the Tuyú Payments.
The Buenos Aires test will have two stages with 10 speed sections that represent 146.30 kilometers for a total of 374.88 kilometers on the Buenos Aires plain and surrounding Laguna La Larga, among others.
The detail of the cars entered by category is as follows: 12 in RC2, 12 in RC Maxi Rally, 12 in RC3, four in RC4 and 14 in RC5.
There will also be news at the regulatory level. The score will be extended for the pilots. There will be two points to start, the top 10 will add up for each stage and, overall, instead of 10 there will now be 15 riders who will score points.
At the category level, the RC2N/4 division has disappeared, now the divisions are: RC2/RC2 Pro/ RCMR/RC3/RC5/R4/ Rally2-Kit.
More cars in RC2
The largest division is the one that will present the main novelties. The drivers and their cars for this season are Alejandro Cancio, Nicolás Díaz and Federico Cadamuro, with Skoda Fabia. Augusto D’Agostini, Miguel Baldoni and Claudio Robustelli will also drive a Skoda Fabia. While Leandro Bonnin, Rodrigo Di Salvo and the Uruguayan Rodrigo Zeballos will go aboard Citroën C3.
Another driver who will run with Citroën C3 is Diego Miceli and they complete the lot with Mario and Santiago Baldo with a Hyundai i20.
For his part, the Chilean Martín Scuncio will add another Hyundai i20 to the batch of R5 units, which are completed with the Ford Fiesta of Juan Carlos Alonso.