Delayed All-Electric World Rallycross RX1e Category to Debut in Hell, Norway

• The top RX1e racing category of the FIA World Rallycross Championship will kick off its season in Hell, Norway, on August 13-14.

• The launch date was slated for July 30-31 at the Nürburgring in Germany, but that event was postponed to allow teams an additional two weeks to prepare for the opener.

• The all-electric WRX was supposed to debut in 2021, but supply chain issues delayed car builds.

World Rallycross Championship—the FIA's latest all-electric racing category—is slated to finally plug in and take off at Hell, Norway, on August 13-14.

The launch date for the RX1e category in the WRX series was slated for July 30-31 at the Nürburgring in Germany, but that event was postponed to allow teams an additional two weeks to prepare for the opener. The category joins the Formula E open-wheel series and the SUV-inspired Extreme E series in the growing FIA portfolio of eco-friendly electric racing offerings.

"We are proud in Norway to be leading the energy transition in the automotive industry—90% of new cars sold here now are either electric or hybrid, so there are plenty of synergies with what Rallycross promoter is doing," said Tor Helge Forbord Slind, promoter and CEO of Hell RX AS.

"We look forward to putting on an incredible event for fans next month with sensational action in all four classes.”

An anticipated 14-car class will feature all-electric-powered rally cars with Austrian-manufacturer Kreisel Electric providing the powertrains for the field. Those powertrains are expected to generate 500 kW of power, the equivalent of 680 hp. The cars will also boast 880 Nm of torque, which promoters say will allow the cars to accelerate faster than a Formula 1 car.

To date, GCK Motorsport/Lancia and Hanson Motorsport/Peugeot have released renderings of their cars for the series.

The series was originally slated to go full electric in 2021, but COVID and supply chain concerns delayed car builds and pushed the series debut to 2022.

"We are taking a major step this year and have no doubt that electric technology will elevate World RX to the next level, but such a significant evolution takes time and nobody has been immune to the global challenges of the past two years," said Arne Dirks, executive director, Rallycross promoter GmbH, in a press release. "Together with the teams, we are committed to presenting the new cars to fans in the best way possible, and we are confident the extra two weeks' preparation time will enable everybody to do that."

The Nürburgring will now host the season finale in November.

"We had a wonderful first World RX event last year, with some superb racing and a fantastic title battle that went right the way down to the wire.

"And while it is a shame not to be able to host the first round of the sport's new electric era, we are very much looking forward to staging the season finale again," said Nürburgring CEO Ingo Boder."