What is a Championship anyway?
Competition time
Championship: A Championship may be a series of Competitions or a single Competition.
Competition: Single motor sport activity with its own results. It may comprise (a) heat(s) and a final, free practice, qualifying practice sessions and results of several categories or be divided in some similar manner, but must be completed by the end of the Event. The following are considered as a Competition: Circuit Races, Rallies, Cross-Country Rallies, Drag Races, Hill Climbs, Record Attempts, Tests, Trials, Drifting, Slalom and other form of Competitions at the discretion of the FIA.
Event: An Event is made up of one or several of: Competition, Parade, Demonstration or Touring Assembly.
-Definitions, FIA International Sporting Code
So, a championship is not a competition itself according to the FIA.
I bet, like much of the rest of the world, you thought this:
championship: (noun) a high-level competition to decide who is the best, especially in a sport
-Cambridge Dictionary
Apparently not in international motorsport! Championships in athletics, snooker, darts, cycling, bowls… etc; tend to be tournaments - many competitions organised as part of one event. A league or conference may be the better name given where each competitor faces each other on the basis of equal competition. The FIA does not define either Tournament, League or, as far as I know, any other style of ‘competition’.
The dictionary definition of Championship does at least make a little bit of sense in FIA-land, only the high-level FIA can organise an international championship (or authorise organisation of one). Third parties can organise an international cup, trophy, challenge or series with only FIA approval. An example is the Extreme E International Series.
Not only is Extreme E not a championship in name, but it cannot be a World series either. Code article 2.4.3 dictates use of the word "world" in the name of a championship, cup, trophy or series. Two of those rules are that they:
2.4.3.a …involve the participation, on average over the entire season, of at least four automobile makes.
2.4.3.b.i …must include Competitions taking place on at least three continents during the same season.
Extreme E might get there soon but is not there yet.
Interestingly, these rules were only introduced to the International Sporting Code in 2006, and to be honest, I’m not sure why. It affected the Junior World Rally Championship, which in 2007 was forced to become just Junior Rally Championship for one year for not leaving Europe, before returning to JWRC and travelling for 2008-2010. Since 2011 however, the Junior WRC (or JWRC) has never been called Junior World Rally Championship in full. More of this below.
The World Rally Championship and its Championships
Article 1.1… of the World Rally Championship regulations:
The FIA organises the FIA World Rally Championship (the Championship) which is the property of the FIA. The World Rally Championship is governed by the FIA International Sporting Code and its appendices (the Code) and these regulations which consist of articles applicable to one or more of the following specific Championships/Cups:
FIA World Rally Championship for Drivers
FIA World Rally Championship for Manufacturers
FIA World Rally Championship for Teams
FIA WRC2 Open Championship for Drivers
FIA WRC2 Junior Championship for Drivers
FIA WRC2 Championship for Teams
FIA WRC2 Masters Cup for Drivers
FIA WRC3 Open Championship for Drivers
FIA WRC3 Junior Championship for Drivers
FIA WRC3 Championship for Teams
FIA RGT Cup for Drivers
The Championship rallies are published on the FIA annual calendar
(For all Drivers, ditto Co-Drivers)
Further, the WRC2 and WRC3 Championships listed below are not listed above:
6. FIA SUPPORT CHAMPIONSHIPS (FIA WRC2 FIA WRC3)
6.1.1 The FIA WRC2 Championship is a Championship for Teams, Drivers and Co-Drivers taking part in the qualifying rallies using eligible cars as in Art. 12.2.
6.1.2 The FIA WRC3 (ditto)
These are, like the Championship (WRC), strictly series of rallies. Within them are the specific championships that award the titles on champions. That’s not contradicting the top of this page, where it was established the FIA’s championships aren’t competitive. The points allocated and collected each round are by-products of the classifications of competitions, they are still series of rallies.
Let’s be clear:
WRC2, WRC3 and JWRC are not world championships, they are ‘WRC’ branded championships
The support championships, as a series of rallies, are the same series as the full WRC calendar. The specific championships/cups within the support championships are restricted to any 5, 6 or 7 rallies. None are world championships. They are escaped from those ‘world word’ rules. Nowhere, is it defined what WRC2 and WRC3 stand for. Nowhere, will you find “World Rally Championship 2”, although you would have done until 2014!
With only one car make homologated in Group Rally3, WRC3 cannot possibly comply with the four makes rule yet. As for the continents rule no entries were received in New Zealand and Japan in 2022, but at least they were open to them.
Addition: Since I drafted this post, the organiser of Rally Finland has conveniently provided a supporting statement that WRC2 and WRC3 are not world championships:
Thank you to the Finnish ASN member of the FIA! It’s impossible to get supporting evidence from the FIA or WRC Promoter.
Hopefully, it may all make sense now in such things as why the FIA do not think there is anything wrong with the lack of head-to-head competition in WRC2 and WRC3. Maybe Andreas Mikkelsen would like to see a Rally2/WRC2 League, but whether there is enough demand for it, etc etc - are questions for another time and place. But as JWRC has shown, there’s no ruling why either couldn’t be reduced to a European only championship for example.