Rallying rules
Posted by Nick Trott at 3:00PM on Monday 22 January, 2007 8 Comments
Just come back from the Monte Carlo Rally.
Never been to a WRC event before; never felt the urge. The thought of hanging out with rally fans with their bobble-hats, Thermos flasks and their general suicide-inducing geekery filled me with dread.
Why the hell would I walk three hours along a muddy track in the pissing rain to get to a vantage point in the middle of a damp forest to watch a rally car flash past? Because rallying is unreal. I did it as a fan. I had a new Mini Cooper S Works on the drive and simply buggered off. The missus wasn't too happy.
Less than 12 hours later I was in, er, Valence for the Rally HQ. Valence is 250 miles northeast of Monaco. Que?
Anyhoo, I tracked the rally with my TomTom, drank vin chaud with the fans, lit a fire, parked the car precariously on the edge of a cliff and walked. And walked. And walked.
Then it happened.
A WRC car. A 300bhp, four-wheel-drive, turbocharged Citroen C4. Full chat. Machine-gun rat-tat-tat from the exhaust. Burping flames. Heading towards me at 100mph. I'm standing behind some, erm, tape.
Please don't crash.
So this is what rallying is about. During the next three seconds I watch a WRC deity execute the kind of driving brilliance I've never before witnessed.
Current WRC champ Sébastien Loeb throws the C4 on its nose. The undertray sparks out. A handbrake turn follows, the car pivots 180 degrees, Loeb's back on the gas, oversteering, accelerating.
The next corner is 100mph+ but Loeb is still on it. Relentless speed. Pure commitment. Then he's gone from sight. Pif-paf-pof.
Did I mention the corner was wet, covered in gravel and on the edge of a 500ft drop with no barrier?
You witness more driving, pure driving, on one muddy corner in a rally than you will during an entire F1 Grand Prix. And I love F1, unconditionally.
In those three seconds I saw, heard, and felt Loeb drive - and I mean really drive - that C4. It was mesmerising. It was worth the walk. The effort. The journey.
And I felt like I was watching history in the making.
Why? Because if Loeb is the greatest rally driver that's ever lived (go on, argue with the stats), he must be the greatest driver that's ever lived.
Trust me, you should put your rallying preconceptions aside and watch him at work. The first Rally Ireland is on November 16-18...
I'll see you there.
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8 Comments for "Rallying rules"
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I too think WRC is the greatest form of driving.
The problem is TV coverage. Rallies usually span an entire day over 3-4 days.
No TV station is prepared to give that kind of coverage.
Someone should invent a cheap Pay-per-View channel called 'WRC TV' or something. They can show different angles, bonnet-view, cockpit-view...etc.
Loeb is the best, but it terms of flat-out speed, I think Gronholm and an in-form Solberg are pretty awesome as well. McRae and Makinnen were quick as well.
All cars should be outlawed, except Evo's and STI's. Oh....and bring back the 22B.
Can't wait until they come to Portugal this year, going to see them live for sure.
I've been telling people this for years Nick! On a whim I decided several years ago to head off to the Swedish rally (and I'm American, so that's quite a whim). The temperatures dipped to -27 degrees and the whole country was under two feet of snow. I was dressed like Scott of the Antarctic and walking miles to see these cars drive by me. And it was worth every degree and step. To see these guys flying (literally) through a forest on a road made entirely of ice and snow at unthinkable speeds just feet from your outstretched head is truly amazing. Every race fan owes it to themselves to see a rally.
The description of the feelings that you feel at the moment a top-driver goes past you in a rally is spot-on! You don't care about the mud, you don't care about the dirt, you don't even care about the danger! You just want to feel more of this excitement and increased level of adrenaline in your blood-stream that this real-unreal driving gives you! I feel bad every time I can't make it to the Acropolis...
I agree! I love to watch rallying on the TV even though they only show highlights. The exileration provided by it is the key and to be a spectator must be awesome! For them to have so much courage through such treacherous corners is phenomenal!
If you want the best rally in the U.K., never mind the Welsh one head to the Jim Clark Memorial Rally in the Borders region of Scotland. Closed public roads, Irish championship WRC cars, British championship group Ns trying to keep up (some do...) and local nutters in Escorts. And it'll be sunny.
The best sport in the world, without doubt. But what a disgrace this year that the UK terrestrial TV channels appear to not deem it important enough to show a ONE HOUR program, but yet football gets saturation coverage. This is not acceptable !
i agree totally. i saw Leob, Gronholm, Solberg and Co in germany in 05 and felt the exact same thing. at the corner we were at, Leobs teamate that year, Duval flicked the car sideways into the last corner and powered away. my heart stopped. the cheers for that were delayed by 4 seconds, by this time, duval was halfway to the start of the next stage. we all bailed into the car and Tom Tom brought us to another stage. it beats f1 for excitement, and driving skill. (stood outside becketts in 97, no comparison)