"St.Petersburg Northern Forest" International Baja regulations approved by FIA

FIA approved the regulations for "St.Petersburg Northern Forest" International Baja provided by the organizers.

In 2008 "St.Petersburg Northern Forest" International Baja will be held as a candidate for the FIA International Cup for Cross-Country Bajas. This status determines exclusive standards of the competition organization but also a number of some procedures concerning the preparation of official papers.

According to these procedures, three months before the start of the race, on November 21st the organizers forwarded to FIA the proposal of International baja regulations based on FIA sportive regulations. This proposal was studied by FIA commission for rally raids whose members made several recommendations concerning the regulations in order to make them more clear for the participants.

It should be noted that the regulations altogether were declared corresponding to FIA requirements, so that the relatively long time needed for the approval is related to the specific points missing in ordinary FIA regulations that doesn't take into account the possibility of winter rally raids. "St.Petersburg Northern Forest" is the only snow baja in FIA international calendar, so the organizers had to take into account such nuances as use of studded tyres and their interchange with ordinary tyres for passing the liaisons, as well as engine start in cold weather etc.

Even exteriorly unimportant details were registered, such as crews staying in cars during regrouping. Normally the regrouping follows a Parc Ferme order, that is, all crews should leave their cars and stop the engines. However at low temperature some of the frozen cars wouldn't leave such a closed park, and also competitors health would be under threat - many people remember the difficulties competitors experienced in 2006 as the temperature was about - 30 °C...

Finally all the details of the regulations were approved, and the organizers were allowed to publish it. You can find the text of international baja regulations in the Regulations section.