Someone explain the modern WRC point system to me

[MentalParadox]

It used to be easier, right? Last season I watched start to finish was 2004, and I was only a kid back then (15). All teams on the list were actual car brands, and the system was easy as pie - two drivers per team, add both drivers' points tally to get the manufacturers' points. Highest score wins.

Now, it's 2017 and I feel you need a bloody Masters' degree to understand all those rules and regulations. Allow me to explain my confusion about the constructors' championship for starters:

M-sport (formerly Ford, right?) has 40 points: Ogier has 25 from his win, Tanak 15 from 3rd. This makes sense so far.
Toyota has 24 points: Latvala has 18 points from 2nd, Hanninen scored only 3 points from 3rd on the power stage, as his 16th place gets him no points. 18+3=21. So... 24???
Hyundai has 20 points: Sordo scored 13 points total (including his PS score) and Neuville only brings home his 5 PS points (15th overall, no normal points). To me, that's 18 points... not 20!
Citroën has 10 points... Breen scored those 10 I guess, but what about Lefebre? Isn't he their 3rd driver? The best 2 scores of the team count, right? So why don't Lefebre's 6 points make it 16 for Citroën?

Then there's the drivers' championship. On the WRC broadcast, it showed the final standings. For some reason, WRC drivers and WRC 2 drivers were all thrown in the same ranking, and the WRC 2 guys even scored WRC points... huh?? Aren't those classes supposed to be entirely separate? I can go to the WRC website, and see the WRC 2 rankings, where I see our Norwegian friend whatshisname (sorry, still trying to learn all those new names) got 25 points in the WRC 2 rankings. So... what are those overall points for? If WRC 2 class have their own rankings next to the overall one, why doesn't WRC class?

I tried figuring it all out on my own, but something just doesn't add up.

[N.O.T]

the last stage of each rally award points as well to the first 5.

5-4-3-2-1

breen was in a 16 car he did not score manufacturer points.

[Myrvold]

Powerstage does not count towards the Manufacturer points. Only the two best drivers from each team can score points. No 2016 car is allowed to score manufacturer points.
Scoring for Manufacturers are individual from the driver scorings, in the way that it removes every single driver not eligible to score manufacturer points(3rd best in a team, all non WRC 2017 cars).

Manufacturer Scoring Monte:
1st: Ogier, M-Sport - 25 points
2nd: Latvala, Toyota - 18 points
3rd: Tanak, M-Sport - 15 points
4th: Sordo, Hyundai - 12 points
5th: Lefebvre, Citroën - 10 points
6th: Neuville, Hyundai - 8 points
7th: Hänninen, Toyota - 6 points.

I am not sure when you started watching, but this is the same way it was done before 2004 as well. Like Rally Sweden 2001. Harri Rovanperä won, but Grönholm and Auriol was nominated for points, so 2nd placed Rådström brought home the win and max points for Mitsubishi and 10th placed Thiry took the last manufacturer point for Skoda with a 6th of those who could score.

Regarding the driver standings, this is the way it always have been. The lower classes, back in 2004, the Group N cars in PWRC and the S1600 cars in JWRC had their own scoring. But the top 8 of the rally scored points towards the drivers world title. It never matters what car you drive, as long as it was legal, if you got it into top 8 (in 2004) you scored. The non-WRC driver with most points in 2004 was Chris Atkinson, with a 5th place and 4 points in Australia if my memory serves me right.
It's just that with more Gr.A/WRC cars an fewer point scoring positions back in early 2000's this usually only happened in the rallies far away from Europe, like Argentina and Australia and of course the Safari Rally. Now we will have rallies with just 10-12 WRC 2017 cars, it is guaranteed to see lower classes scoring overall points. But this is nothing new, and shouldn't be confusing to be honest.

[Sulland]

WRC 2017 point scoring system


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017_World_Rally_Championship#FIA_World_Championsh ip_for_Manufacturers

Tried to find it from FIA, but there it was not explained very easy....

[MentalParadox]

Thank you all for explaining, it all makes sense now. What about Evans' status? I regularly see him mentioned as part of M-sport, but his car is labeled as D-mack. Who does he score points for? Is that even a 2017 Fiesta?

And why is M-sport even considered eligible for scoring points, if they have no official backing from Ford? They're just a private team (albeit very well funded).

[KiwiWRCfan]

Each manufacturer team may nominate either 2 or 3 drivers for each WRC round in 2017. If 3 drivers are nominated only best 2 are able to score manufacturer points but all 3 can score driver championship points.
The 3 drivers nominated by MSport for Monte Carlo and Sweden are Ogier, Tanak and Evans. All 3 are driving 2017 Fiesta's. All the nominated cars need to be 2017 specification but they are allowed to use either Michelin or DMack tyres. Individual drivers can only use 1 brand of tyres for the season.
MSport have been permitted to enter as a manufacturer team since Ford withdrew at end of 2012 season. Ford continue to supply a lot of technical support for MSport. Other forum members will be able to explain more on how MSport qualify as a manufacturer entry.
MSport build more top tier rally cars than any other manufacturer. For example in Sweden there will be twelve 2017 specification WRC cars of which five will be MSport built cars. There will also be 14 cars in WRC2 competition 10 of which are MSport built cars.
MSport deserve a huge amount of respect for what they bring to WRC.

[Myrvold]

Individual drivers can only use 1 brand of tyres for the season.


There must be a Force Majeure there, right? If Evans for some reason have to skip one or more rallies, the DMACK Fiesta cannot be piloted by any guy that's been on Michelin?

[MentalParadox]

OK, so Evans is definitely M-Sport. Why is his car livery so different from the other 2, though?

[GravelBen]

OK, so Evans is definitely M-Sport. Why is his car livery so different from the other 2, though?

Different sponsors.