While one of the greatest events of auto-racing in Latvia is approaching, organisers of Rally Liepāja have prepared a short summary containing the most important information to be serving as a spectator guide for the rally supporters.

- (Jānis Asaris, www.go4speed.lv)

What? Where? When?

Rally Liepāja, round two of the FIA European Rally Championship will take place this year from 31 January until 2 February in the vicinity ofLiepāja and Kuldīga. During the rally participants will have to pass 12 stages with teh total distance of 240 kilometres. The new season of Latvian Rally Championship will also commence during Rally Liepāja, and within the two days of races the sportsmen will have to participate in the first two rounds of the championship.

Powerful composition of participants

57 crews have applied for the races, and the most known participant of this year will be the Frenchman Bryan Bouffier, who won the second position in the first round of the World Rally Championship of 2014. Irish sportsman Craig Breen should be considered one of the favourites; he took the second place in this competition last year staying next to Finn Jari Ketomaa, who will skip the rally this year. Honour of the Finnish auto-racing this year will be protected by Esapekka Lappi, who participates in the last year’s champion team Škoda Motosport.

Junior championship

Rally Liepāja will be the first round of ERC Junior championship. As fierce fight for victory should be expected also in this race among front-wheel drive cars. Number one of this race belongs to the racer of Czech national team Jan Cherny, who will face fierce competition with Finn Risto Immonen, Frenchman Stephane Lefebvre, Norwegian Steve Røkland and other racers, 15 in total. Racers of LMT Autosporta akadēmija – champion of the last year’s Latvian Rally Championship in R2 class Ralfs Sirmacis, as well as Kristaps Feldmanis will not participate in the ERC Junior championship race, but show fierce competition.

- (Aigars Tīdmanis, www.go4speed.lv)

Rally maps

Maps of Rally Liepāja stages are available in magazine TopGear Latvija, issue of February – convenient, mobile format booklet provides the rally spectators with descriptions of viewpoints, GPS coordinates, as well as other kind of useful information.

Rally radio

During the races operative news on the most important events throughout the track in the whole territory of Latvia will be provided by the official rally radio Star FM. Rally radio will inform on results, as well as broadcast interviews with sportsmen during the the stages, as well as experts’ comments in the studio. Rally radio will also provide all the official information from the Rally centre regarding any changes in the course of the rally.

Rally reviews on television

All the rally events will be filmed, and reviews at the end of each rally day will be broadcasted by the sports channel Eurosport. According to current plans, review of each day will be on air shortly after midnight. Television channel TV6 will rebroadcast those programs in the territory of Latvia; we hereby ask the viewers to follow the television channel programme.

Results and news

Viewers can conveniently follow the Rally Liepāja results on the official websit of the Latvian Rally Championship www.autorally.lv adapted also for the mobile devices. Results and racers’ comments will be available also on the website of the European Rally Championship www.fiaerc.com. We ask those who would like to use the mobile application to search for ERC Rally, the official software developed by ERČ providing all results of the races. All news will also be posted on the official website of Rally Liepāja www.lvrally.com and on Twitter account @LVRally.

GPS tracking of participants

All the persons interested in rally will have opportunity to follow the location of each of the racing car on the track. Such an opportunity is provided by GPS transmitter installed in each car for the prior use of the personnel of the Rally centre following the events on the stages from distance with high precision. During Rally Liepāja this signal will be public, and the spectators will also be able to see exact location of their favourite crew. GPS tracking map will be available on the website of Rally Liepāja

- (Jānis Asaris, www.go4speed.lv)

Optibet Winter Cup hockey tournament

On Saturday, February 1 by the stage SS 1/4 Sports bar OPTIBET a hockey tournament Optibet Winter Cup will take place. All the games will take place on the surface of frozen pond by the stage, allowing the gathered viewers to watch rally and hockey game simultaneously. Plan provides participation of seven teams in the hockey game, including the team composed of the rally racers, and the time of begining on Saturday is planned at 10:30. During the breaks of the tournament the viewers will have opportunity to refresh their skating skills, since the skate rent will also be available.

Fish day

For those, who are less interested in rally events, an activity for children and families called Fish day will take place in Liepāja promenade offering the tasting of free salmon soup prepared by the young cooks of Liepāja State technical college as well as opportunuty to buy fish, smoked meat products and other delicacies to be tasted accompanied by wide range of culture programme.

Safety of viewers

Organizers of Rally Liepāja together with security partner LDz Cargo call the viewers to be careful and follow the instructions provided by the security staff. We also call the experienced rally viewers to ensure order in the special stages – be responsible for the neighbours and viewers possibly attending the rally for the first time. Information about the locations on the side of the track, where presence of viewers is forbidden, is available also on the admission tickets of rally. Hear! See! Live!