WRC Rally Italia Sardegna
Italy
Starts: Thursday, May 30, 2024 at 7:00:00 AM
ERC Bauhaus Royal Rally of Scandinavia
Sweden
Starts: Thursday, June 13, 2024 at 7:00:00 AM
Euro RX of France
France
Starts: Saturday, June 8, 2024 at 6:00:00 AM

Wed 15 Nov 2023

Schock versus Travaglia in latest ERC Greatest Driver vote

Voting to decide the ERC Greatest Driver continues today (Wednesday) with a battle between Walter Schock and Renato Travaglia.

Schock was the FIA European Rally Championship’s first double title winner with the top prize going his way in 1956 and again in 1960.   His second crown came five years before Travaglia was born with the Italian securing his second ERC title 40 years later, in 2005, three years after his first ERC triumph in 2002.  


Part of the European championship’s ongoing 70th anniversary celebrations, the ERC Greatest Driver voting is in its second week. After Dario Cerrato beat Gunnar Andersson to a place in the quarter-finals on Monday, Giandomenico Basso was a convincing winner over Simon Jean-Joseph in yesterday’s head-to-head contest.   


Luca Rossetti, Kajetan Kajetanowicz, Sobiesław Zasada and Patrick Snijers all made it through to the quarter-finals during the first week of voting.  


FIAERC.com used a data-based approach to pick out 12 drivers who have won the European Rally Championship at least two times. Four wildcards, based on their impact during a certain ERC era, were also selected for the voting process. The ERC Greatest Driver, according to your votes, will be revealed on 1 December.  


The vote between Schock and Travaglia begins at 11:00 CET.  


History-making Schock to the system
Walter Schock made history in 1960 when he became the first double winner of the FIA European Rally Championship title. The German, who passed away in 2005 at the age of 85, claimed the ERC crown for the first time in 1956 driving a Mercedes-Benz. And he was reliant on Mercedes-Benz power when he scored his historic championship double, which came courtesy of wins on Rallye Monte-Carlo, the Acropolis Rally and Rally Poland.  


Travaglia wins in two different ERC eras
After being one of the last drivers to clinch ERC title gold during its World Rally Car-based era in 2002, Renato Travaglia was also the FIA European Rally Championship’s top driver in 2005, one year after its switch to Super 1600 technology and a move away from the coefficient calendar format. That was when multiple events awarded varying levels of points depending on their status. Driving a Peugeot 206 WRC, Travaglia completed the 2002 season a seven-time winner. When he took his second title in 2005, he was armed with a Renault Clio S1600 and landed three wins.  


Thursday’s ERC Greatest Driver head-to-head: Alexey Lukyanuk versus Fabrizio Tabaton