Rally Turkey Ready for Challenge with New Stages
The Turkish Automobile Sports Federation (TOSFED) has announced the 2019 route for Rally Turkey, round 11 of the FIA World Rally Championship, which has been officially approved by the FIA. The event will be based in Marmaris and run from 12-15 September. The route features 17 special stages, with 310.10 kilometres of the 988.50-kilometre itinerary set to be competitive.
Only a few minor changes have been made to the successful format used in 2018. These include the arrival of the 17km Kızlan stage (SS10 and SS13), which runs around the coastline and offers spectacular scenery, and the twisting Çiçekli stage (SS16), which moves from Friday to Sunday and will be run in the opposite direction to 2018 ahead of the Power Stage. 
The service park will once again be located a short distance from Marmaris, on the hilltop at Asparan, and the crews will begin the event on Thursday 12 September with a short shakedown stage at Değirmanyanı.
The ceremonial start and a two-kilometre spectator stage will take place on Thursday evening, with the stage action starting on Friday morning from Marmaris Square, drawing thousands of spectators to the city centre. 
The crews will tackle a total of six stages on Friday. The drivers will begin with the 24.80km İçmeler stage, before moving on to Çetibeli, which has seen minor changes compared with last year and, at 38.15km, is the longest stage of the rally. The morning loop concludes with the 16.57km Ula stage. The drivers will repeat these three stages in the afternoon before returning to the service park at Asparan. 
According to the schedule, Saturday 14 September also features six stages. The day starts with the 33km Yeşilbelde stage, followed by the 8.75km Datça stage. The crews will then tackle the Kızlan stage before returning to the service park at Asparan. These three stages will be repeated on Saturday afternoon. Datça may be a short stage by WRC standards, but it offers a magnificent backdrop of stunning scenery and the sea.
On Sunday 15 September, two 7.22km Marmaris stages will be run, the second of which will be the Power Stage. With the 11.32km Gökçe and 13.20km Çiçekli stages also run that day, the final day of the rally will present the crews with a tough challenge. 
The Marmaris stage will start at İçmeler and finish at the service park. The Power Stage held there will mark the end of an event that, for the second year in a row, promises an exciting WRC rally by the sea.
Rally Turkey first joined the WRC calendar in 2003 and was run until 2010, before returning to the championship in 2018. Last year's event, the first since its return to the calendar, was won by Ott Tänak and Martin Järveoja, who beat the Toyota Yaris WRC of their rivals by 22.3 seconds. In 2017, when the Marmaris-Muğla region hosted a WRC candidate event, victory went to the Turkish crew of Orhan Avcıoğlu and Burçin Korkmaz.
