Auto racing is a motorsport involving the racing of automobiles for competition. In North America, the term is commonly used to describe all forms of automobile sport including non-racing disciplines.
The Sports Car Club of America (SCCA) is a non-profit American automobile club and sanctioning body supporting Autocross, Rallycross, HPDE, Time Trial, Road Racing, and Hill Climbs in the United States. Formed in 1944, it runs many programs for both amateur and professional racers.
Rallying is a wide-ranging form of motorsport with various competitive motoring elements such as speed tests, navigation tests, or the ability to reach waypoints or a destination at a prescribed time or average speed. Rallies may be short in the form of trials at a single venue, or several thousand miles long in an extreme endurance rally.
Motorsport(s) or motor sport(s) are sporting events, competitions and related activities that primarily involve the use of automobiles, motorcycles, motorboats and powered aircraft. For each of these vehicle types, the more specific terms automobile sport, motorcycle sport, power boating and air sports may be used commonly, or officially by organisers and governing bodies.
Autocross is a form of motorsport in which competitors are timed to complete a short course using automobiles on a dirt or grass surface, excepting where sealed surfaces are used in United States. Rules vary according to the governing or sanctioning body, such as the length of the course, the amount of permitted attempts, or whether competitors start the course individually at intervals or at the same time as others. In this latter form, Autocross differs from other forms of motor racing by using a system of heats or alternative timing methods for the classification rather than racing for position and declaring the first across the finish line as the winner.
Rallycross is a form of sprint style automobile racing, held on a closed mixed-surface racing circuit, with modified production or specially built road cars, similar to the World Rally Cars. It is mainly popular in the Nordic countries, the Netherlands, Belgium, France and Great Britain. An inexpensive, entry level type of rallycross is the Swedish folkrace or its Norwegian counterpart, the so-called bilcross. The folkrace is most popular in Finland where it was founded back in the late 1960s. In Europe, rallycross can also refer to racing 1:8 scale off-road radio-controlled buggies.
The GT World Challenge America is a North American auto racing series launched in 1990 by the Sports Car Club of America. It has been managed by the SRO Motorsports Group since 2018, and has been sanctioned by the United States Auto Club since 2017.
Autograss is a form of motor racing, with races organised at various venues across the UK and Ireland. The roots of the discipline can be traced back to the 1960s.
The Rally America National Championship was the national championship of rallying events in the United States. The inaugural season was in 2005. Rally America was also the name given to the organization that sanctioned the championship, was briefly rebranded to RallyCar in July 2010, then reverted to Rally America the following year. 2018 was the final year that Rally America sanctioned a rally event. In 2019 Rally America briefly became a media organization with the stated goal of promoting rallying in the United States before pausing all social media posts and shutting down its official website.
The European Rallycross Championship is a rallycross competition held in Europe, organised under the auspices of the FIA.
Combined driving is an equestrian sport involving carriage driving. In this discipline, the driver sits on a vehicle drawn by a single horse, a pair or a team of four. The sport has three phases: dressage, cross-country marathon and obstacle cone driving — patterned after the mounted equestrian sport of eventing. It is one of the ten international equestrian sport horse disciplines recognized by the Fédération Équestre Internationale (FEI). Combined driving became an FEI discipline in 1970 when Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, the then-president of FEI, produced the first rule book.
In relation to international motorsport governed by the FIA, Group N refers to regulations providing "standard" large-scale series production vehicles for competition. They are limited in terms of modifications permitted to the standard specification by the manufacturer making them a cost effective method of production vehicle motorsport. Often referred to as the "showroom class", Group N contrasts with Group A which has greater freedom to modify and tune the cars to be more suitable to racing. Both groups may have the same or similar models homologated by a manufacturer.
The International Sporting Code (ISC) is a set of rules applicable to all four-wheel motorsport as governed by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA). It was first implemented in 1926.
Formula 1000 (F1000) is a class of open wheel formula racing with professional and amateur series worldwide. Formula 1000 gets its name from the 1000 cc super-bike engine used to power a single seat, open wheel race car with fully adjustable wings and suspension.
Gymkhana is a type of motorsport, known as Motorkhana in Australia and New Zealand and as Autotesting in the United Kingdom and Ireland. Similar to autocross, the goal of gymkhana is to achieve the fastest time possible; memorizing the course is a significant part of achieving a fast time. The name is loaned from the equestrian discipline of gymkhana.
The RallyCar Rallycross Championship is a rallycross championship held in the United States. Founded in 2010, it is the first series in America for European-style rallycross competition. The series is run by RallyCar, which also runs the Rally America stage rallying series.
In the United States, autocross is an individual motorsport in which drivers compete to set the fastest time on a temporary course. It differs from autocross in the rest of the world as events are usually held on large paved areas, such as parking lots or airfields compared to grass or dirt surfaces used elsewhere. Courses consist of turns, offsets, and slaloms marked by traffic cones; new courses are typically created for each event. In the rest of the world these types of events are known as autotests, autoslaloms or gymkhanas.
Subaru Motorsports USA is Subaru of America's motorsports arm that participates in events in the United States and its operations are managed by Vermont SportsCar, previously Prodrive.
The FIA World Rallycross Championship is a rallycross series organised by the FIA in conjunction with series promoter Rallycross Promoter GmbH. From the inaugural season in 2014 to 2020, IMG Motorsport fulfilled the role of promoter.
Autoslalom is a form of motorsport that takes place on short, temporary courses marked out on areas of sealed-surfaces such as car parks or disused airport runways. Competitors are timed to complete the course, with penalties given for diverting from the route or for touching the course markers. Each competitor starts individually and speeds are kept low to emphasise safety and to require good vehicle control.
