Rally - Moving On

The papers have moved on from the weekend. It seems that some journalists have the attention span of a three year old. Play with it till it's broken, then move on. Don't look back, and find something new to break.

Two papers on Sunday printed pictures of a young rally driver claiming that he had been driving the car involved on Saturday's accident. It wasn't. They had used the wrong picture. Apology? Remorse? Don't hold your breath.

Just looking back at the weekend's comments on the Forums and other forms of social media, it would appear that there was less hysteria than in the past. Maybe we are all getting used to this new electronic messaging tool at last and using it better and more repsonsibly. Perhaps the novelty is wearing off. A noticably big improvement on the hysterical furore surrounding the death of a rally driver on another Scottish event two years ago.

For sure there are still some who start using their digits long before they engage their brain, but that's the same in any sport or wider society. What was more encouraging was the fact that many Forum users were urging restraint on fellow users to moderate comment and language till the facts were known. That bodes well for the future.

The fact that the press is moving on will also now allow those involved in the sport to sit down and consider new ideas and improvements away from the glare of headlines and column inches. Compared to many other sports, rallying is still inherently safe. One of the pundits wheeled out on weekend television talked of three deaths in the past twenty odd years, two co-drivers and one driver, that's still three too many, but it really hit home at the weekend when a spectator was involved. Somehow, that was even worse.