WRC+, let’s see what all the fuss is about
World Rally Blog joined the WRC+ family of fans today. I thought I should pay up and see what this is all about, since I am actually writing and pretending to be clever and witty about it all. I’ve decided to go with a monthly option, which costs 5€ per month. If you want to save some cash, there is a 12 month option for 49.99€, and to which you can also add a promo code (which I will not utter here unless needed, it will hit you in the face as soon as you first step into WRC+’s website lobby) for additional discount.
I wanted to see first hand what is available for these few euros each month and I also had to see how it all works during the actual WRC event. With Monte Carlo Rally only hours away, I will soon be able to see just how effective many of WRC+ promises are. But even before Monte gets underway, there are things to keep you busy on WRC+ website, plenty of things. They’re all shiny and nice, I promise. Probably the most popular feature is the Onboard Action section, which is very interesting and entertaining. You can select between single driver view or two drivers comparisons, with split screen view coupled with map showing the actual progress of the cars on the stage. I’m telling you, this thing is really awesome. You can easily see where driver AB lost some time, going wide in two corners, but then went on an all out attack in order to make up for the lost time and you can also compare speeds because, yes, the speed of each car is displayed in “real time” too. Really, really great feature.
Onboard action footage is not the only shiny thing in WRC+’s arsenal, but for the rest of the features, you’ll have to point your mouse pointer to this here link and learn about WRC+ yourself. I plan to use the hell out of it and I’ll try to write down some of my impressions after two or three events. To begin with, there is sometimes a problem in loading one of the onboard videos in comparison view. Then sometimes map is not updated with actual data, as you can see on the image above, with car icons all over the place. Next, I’d like to be able to “lock” the selected drivers, views and/or stages while I make changes to other, unlocked options – for example, I want to compare two drivers on different stages, so I should be able to only select another stage without repeating the drivers and views selection as well.
Do you think a single subscription model is the way to go or should WRC+ fragment its services and offer more options to potential users? I am not sure what to think at this point, but I’ve heard this question raised before so I’ll try to approach WRC+ with those questions in mind too.
