FIA confirms WRC calendar for 2005.

The FIA, the governing body for the World Rally Championship, today [Friday] confirmed the schedule for 2005.

Like the provisional one issued in October, there are few changes to the calendar from 2004, with 16 rounds taking competitors from Monte Carlo to Australia over the course of eleven long months.

The calendar, approved by the World Motor Sport Council, does however have four slight date changes compared to that issued a few months ago - three of these are to ensure there are no clashes with Formula One [the changes are indictated below].

The Junior and Production Car World Rally Championship schedules were also confirmed at the same time.

The full schedule is as follows:

2005 FIA World Rally Championship - calendar:

January 21-23 Rallye Automobile Monte-Carlo*
February 11-13 Uddeholm Swedish Rally**
March 11-13 Corona Rally Mexico*
April 8-10 Propecia Rally New Zealand**
April 29-May 1 Supermag Rally Italia-Sardinia*
May 13-15 Cyprus Rally**
June 3-5# Rally of Turkey**
June 24-26# Acropolis Rally of Greece*
July 15-17# Rally Argentina**
August 5-7 Neste Rally Finland*
August 26-28 OMV ADAC Rallye Deutschland*
September 16-18 Wales Rally GB**
September 30-October 2 Rally Japan**
October 21-23# Rallye de France - Tour de Corse*
October 28-30 Rally de Catalunya - Espa?a*
November 11-13 Telstra Rally Australia**

* denotes round accompanied by JWRC
** denotes round accompanied by PCWRC
# denotes date change.