The 365 kilometres of competition starts on Thursday evening with two night stages. There is no gentle start to the year: the opening stage is just shy of being the longest of the event at over 28 kilometres.
The weather in January in Monte Carlo will be typically cold, and this year the rally has been scheduled one week later in an attempt to ensure the snow that the rally just missed last season.
FIA World Rally Championship news:
There are a number of changes this year to the WRC and in addition to the fact there will be no Marcus Gronholm – and he will be definitely missed - the biggest difference concerns the tyres.
The Monte will be the first rally in which the teams will use the Pirelli championship control tyre and there will be just three options: the DS soft slick tyre, the snow WX tyre without metal studs, and the WX tyre with studs that provide extra traction on icy sections. Anti-deflation devices have also been banned and this could definitely influence the outcome of events.
"We always say that a rally is never over until you cross the finish line and I think that will be even more so in the future,"
BP Ford team director, Malcolm Wilson told
Crash.net Radio recently when asked about the changes. "There is still a great unknown out there at the moment.
"All it needs is for a driver to throw up one rock and you come round a corner and you are on your line and you can't change it. It is inevitable then that you will probably burst a tyre. You could end up in a situation when you have got a very good lead and coming out of the final corner on the final stage something like that could happen.
"I think it is another dimension that we are going to have to get use to and there is still a lot of tactics to be sorted out. Do you take one spare? Do you take two spares? There are a lot of possibilities and while everyone will be looking for performance, I think we will see drivers' changing wheels on stages."
News from the Manufacturers' teams:
Citroen Total WRT:
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Sebastien Loeb, car #1 and
Daniel Sordo, car #2]
Loeb in line for record win.
Sebastien Loeb will begin his bid to win a record fifth world title this weekend on the Rallye Monte Carlo.
The Frenchman will start the classic as the undisputed favourite and having come out top in 2007, 2005, 2004 and 2003, he could become the most successful driver in the history of the event should he and co-driver, Daniel Elena succeed again this Sunday.
