Glossary
Types of rally, compared
“Rally” covers a surprising number of different sports. Some are flat out on closed roads, some are about arriving at a checkpoint at exactly the right second, and one of them you can do in your road car this weekend. Here is what each actually involves.
Special stage rally
The one most people mean. Closed roads, one car at a time, flat out.
Public roads are closed and timed to the tenth. Cars start at intervals so you are racing the clock rather than the car in front, and the lowest total time across every stage wins. Between stages you drive the public road network at legal speeds to a schedule.
- Timed?
- Yes — to the tenth of a second
- Car
- Caged, logbooked competition car
- In Australia
- The Australian Rally Championship, and every state championship round.
Blind rally
A stage rally with no pace notes and no recce.
Same format, but you have never seen the road. A roadbook of tulip diagrams keeps you on the correct route and everything else is read as it arrives. It rewards a completely different kind of driving — you cannot commit to what you cannot see.
- Timed?
- Yes
- Car
- Same as a stage rally
- In Australia
- Most Australian club rallies. We have run Mitta, the Rally of the Heartland and Ada River blind.
Rallysprint
Short format, one day, usually a closed circuit or a couple of stages repeated.
The standard way into the sport. Low entry fee, low travel, and you get several runs rather than one shot. Often held at a motorsport complex rather than on public roads.
- Timed?
- Yes
- Car
- Competition car, though requirements are usually lighter
- In Australia
- The Presidents Rallysprint and Bagshot Rallysprint on the Victorian calendar.
Regularity rally
Hold an exact average speed. Being fast is not the point.
You are given a target average and the aim is to pass secret checkpoints at precisely the right moment. Points are lost for being early as well as late, so it is a test of consistency and arithmetic rather than pace. Frequently runs alongside a stage rally as a separate classification.
- Timed?
- Yes, but against a target rather than for speed
- Car
- Often road-registered; far lower barrier to entry
- In Australia
- The Shamrock Haulage RD Cup runs with the Rally of the Bay, and the Rally of the Heartland counts for the SA Regularity Series.
TSD / road rally
Time-speed-distance navigation on open public roads at legal speeds.
The navigator is the athlete. You work from a route sheet, solving distance and average-speed problems on the move, and score by arriving at controls exactly on time. No closed roads, no helmets, and margins of a few seconds accumulated over many hours.
- Timed?
- Yes, against a calculated schedule
- Car
- Any road-registered car
- In Australia
- Run by clubs across Australia, usually as touring assemblies or navigational trials.
Khanacross / autocross
Low-speed courses in a paddock, against the clock.
A marked course on dirt or grass, one or two cars at a time. The cheapest possible start in the sport and where a lot of national-level competitors began — in Australia juniors can compete from 14.
- Timed?
- Yes
- Car
- Road cars through to purpose-built, depending on class
- In Australia
- Club autocross across every Australian state.
Tarmac rally
Closed-road rallying on sealed surfaces, usually over several days.
Much higher speeds than gravel and a correspondingly higher price for an error. Many tarmac events run a non-competitive touring class alongside, which is a genuine way to experience a closed-road event without racing it.
- Timed?
- Yes
- Car
- Competition car; classes often cap speed for newcomers
- In Australia
- Australian Tarmac Rally rounds, and Targa New Zealand, where we won Production 4WD in 2025.
Cross country rally
Long-distance off-road racing over open terrain, navigated by GPS.
A separate discipline with separate machinery — closer to Dakar than to a forest stage. Routes are defined by waypoints rather than roads.
- Timed?
- Yes
- Car
- Purpose-built off-road vehicles
- In Australia
- The Sunraysia Safari in north-west Victoria.
Where to actually start
Khanacross or a rallysprint, in whatever you already drive. Both are cheap, both are one day, and both will tell you within an hour whether you want the rest of it. Everything above that needs a competition licence, club membership and a car with a cage in it — and none of that is the hard part.