Cycling inspires World Touring Car Championship to bring in team time trial format (+ video)

Motor racing series the World Touring Car Championship (WTCC) has turned to cycling for an innovation for next year’s competition – it’s introducing a team time trial.

Called MAC3 – the initials stand for Manufacturers Against the Clock, with each nominating three vehicles – the format is inspired by the team time trial that features in races such as the Giro d’Italia, Vuelta and Tour de France.

The three vehicles will start alongside each other for two or three laps of the circuit at each round, with the time the third crosses the line determining the time, and points counting towards the manufacturers’ championship.

WTCC promoter Francois Ribeiro told Autosport that the initiative is aimed at making the world manufacturers’ championship more prominent.

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"If you put the manufacturers in a room and ask them which world title they want most, the manufacturers' title or the drivers' title, all of them immediately will say the manufacturers’,” he explained.

"It's a kind of paradox, because you see the drivers' title is always the most exposed on media.

"For a while I have been looking for an idea, how to better promote the manufacturers' title, give it more value, so that it becomes a bit more than just the addition of the two best individual results of the drivers.

"I was watching a cycling race in May and I saw the team time trial and that reminded me of the pictures of WTCC qualifying a few years ago when there was no Q1, Q2, Q3.

"When the SEATs and then the Chevrolets were truly qualifying together to bring not only the first car but also the third or fourth car as quick as possible on the flying lap.

"I remember that it was beautiful on TV. I said to myself, 'why don't we import that team trial concept from cycling into motorsport?'"

Autosport says that teams will be able to fit new tyres and fuel vehicles before the MAC3 laps, which will happen 10 minutes after qualifying sessions.

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Ribeiro says that the manufacturers have quickly bought into the concept.

"Some of them knew about cycling and team time trials, so it was easy for them to understand.

“Some of them were not very familiar, so we showed them some simulations, how it would look on screen and how the TV format would look, and they understood it would be very interesting to follow the dynamic within each team.”

He added that drivers would have to put their racing instincts to one side and co-operate with one another.

"In qualifying, the first thing a driver wants is to beat his team-mate, and exactly 10 minutes after, he will have to exactly the opposite exercise and drive together for their brand and their employer,” he said.

"The drivers will have to drive together, help each other, slipstream each other. If one of them is making a mistake, and this happens very often in Q3, then it will penalise the entire team."

Citroën currently holds the manufacturers’ championship, having won it in each of the past three seasons. Honda won it in 2013, following a three-year winning streak by Chevrolet.

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The initiative is subject to ratification by the World Motor Sports Council of the Fédération Internationale de l’Automobile.