1911 beginnings In 1909, an association named
Sport Automobile et Vélocipédique de Monaco (which became the
Automobile Club de Monaco in 1925) started planning a car rally at the behest of
Albert I, Prince of Monaco. The Monte Carlo Rally was to start at points all over Europe and converge on Monte Carlo. In January 1911, 23 cars set out from 11 different locations, and
Henri Rougier was among the nine who left
Paris to cover a route. The event was won by Rougier in a
Turcat-Méry 25 Hp. The rally comprised both driving and then somewhat arbitrary judging based on the elegance of the car, passenger comfort and the condition in which it arrived in the
principality. The outcry of scandal when the results were published changed nothing, so Rougier was proclaimed the first winner. Following the
Second World War, works or works-supported teams became more and more important. From 1949 onwards, there was a special Team prize. First winners were the three Allards of Potter, Godsall and Imhof. Simca, Delahaye, Sunbeam-Talbot and Jaguar were subsequent winners. Sydney Allard – as the first and only winner driving his own car – was driving a "works" car in 1952, but Gatsonides also participated in a factory prepared Ford Zephyr in 1953, a year that saw no fewer than eight factory backed Sunbeam-Talbots.
1966 controversy The 1966 event was the most controversial in the history of the Rally. The first four finishers, driving three
Mini-Coopers,
Timo Mäkinen,
Rauno Aaltonen and
Paddy Hopkirk, and
Roger Clark's 4th-placed
Ford Cortina were all disqualified because they used non-dipping single filament quartz iodine bulbs in their headlamps, in place of the standard double filament dipping glass bulbs, which are fitted to the series production version of each models sold to the public. This elevated
Pauli Toivonen (
Citroën ID) into first place overall. Toivonen himself found the situation so embarrassing that he refused to accept his award.
Rosemary Smith (
Hillman Imp) was also disqualified from sixth place, after winning the
Coupe des Dames, the ladies' class. In all, ten cars were disqualified. Teams threatened to boycott the event. The headline in
Motor Sport read "The Monte Carlo Fiasco".
Recent history From
1973 to
2008, the rally was held in January as the first event of the
FIA World Rally Championship. Between
2009 and 2011, it was the opening round of the
Intercontinental Rally Challenge (IRC) programme, a championship for N/A 4WD cars, before returning to the WRC championship season again in
2012. As recently as
1991, competitors were able to choose their starting points from approximately five venues roughly equidistant from
Monte Carlo (one of Monaco's administrative areas) itself. With often varying conditions at each starting point (typically comprising dry
tarmac, wet tarmac,
snow, and
ice, sometimes all in a single stage of the rally), this event places a big emphasis on tyre choices, as a driver has to balance the need for grip on ice and snow with the need for grip on dry tarmac. For the driver, this is often a difficult choice as the tyres that work well on snow and ice normally perform poorly on dry tarmac. The Automobile Club de Monaco confirmed on 19 July 2010 that the 79th Monte Carlo Rally would form the opening round of the new Intercontinental Rally Challenge season. To mark the centenary of the event, the Automobile Club de Monaco also confirmed that Glasgow, Barcelona, Warsaw and Marrakesh were selected as start points for the rally. ==Col de Turini==