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New-look Wales Rally GB 2013 sets the historic event on fire

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This event – when it was the iconic Lombard RAC, then Network Q – is what made me a petrolhead, motoring journalist and lifelong rally fan. Standing

stage-side as a young boy, obligatory bobble hat on and armed with an airhorn, I witnessed the legendary Group B cult cars – 205 T16, Delta Integrale, Audi Quattro – spit flames and gravel, wastegates chattering: I was hooked.

I adored that era of rallying, but I’m not all misty-eyed. The event, the cars and the world of rallying got faster and evolved and I moved with it – always enjoying the unique, special sport. But, in recent years, our only UK WRC round – Wales Rally GB – lost its way, the crowds, and the buzz that went with them. I’m not sure, but it may have even come close to losing WRC favour too: A tragedy.

Cue a re-think, a revitalisation of this historic, amazing, challenging event. And boy, did MSA Chairman, Alan Gow and all the Wales Rally GB team work wonders this year – new North Wales base, night stages, the introduction of family-friendly “RallyFest” stages, lively ceremonial start/finish, pop concerts... the lot. And, best of all, 196-miles of some of the best, most challenging, technical, slippery, tricky and epochal special stages in the world – Hafren, Sweet Lamb, Myherin, Gartheiniog, Dyfi... names that sing louder than a male voice choir to rally fans the world over.

The event re-brand – and targeted, hard work of the PR and social media team – not only created what is essen-tially a new Wales Rally GB event, but it did something even more magical... it brought the crowds back, and with it the uniquely Welsh forest flavour. And the WRC and na-tional drivers didn’t disappoint... as you can read here.

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dominationdub History is made, as

VW win in their inaugural WRC season, then top it with a 1-2 in Wales!

dominationdub

Never in their wildest dreams could VW have predicted the para-

digm-shifting inaugural WRC season they’ve had – Sé-bastien Ogier crowned 2013 champion, the new VW Polo R WRC winning the manufac-turer’s championship by 100+ points, Yari-Matti Latvala claiming third and a 1-2 win in Wales Rally GB to round of the season in sensational style. Dominance doesn’t even cover it!

Team boss, Jost Capito must be in for a big bonus and is surely keen to hang on

to his Ogier, Latvala and An-dreas Mikkelsen dream team for 2014 – not to mention the quiet rally God behind the scenes, “the king of set-up” – Carols Sainz, who’s had a huge part to play in the VW Motorsport success story.

Ogier was untouchable on the tough Welsh gravel event that’s not been kind to him in the past. He set the pace from the off and kept his two-time-WRGB-winning team-mate and gravel ace, Jari-Matti a safe 20-seconds adrift pretty much throughout the entire rally, as the Finn com-

plained of “not getting the feeling with the car I’ve had on these stages in the past” and “making silly mistakes.” Yari pushed hard, and looked spectacular on the stages – having more than a few ‘mo-ments’ on the way. But Ogier responded each time, and kept the Finn at bay... surely proving what a justifiable champion he is, if his eight 2013 wins (& 100% finish record) don’t tell you how ace the 29-year-old is in a WRC car (who started at just 22).

Having already sealed the driver’s title at his home round in France last month, the 29-year-old arrived in Wales brimming with confidence

and with the pressure off. He was so smooth, composed and phenomenally fast – lead-ing for all four days in the for-ests, keeping Yari frustrated.

Mikkelsen had a great rally too – in his Polo R WRC fes-tooned in a cool livery of fan’s photos (right). He looked like a podium contender, until

fellow dude rising star, Thiery Neuville nailed down the No.3 spot with an awesome drive in his Qatar M-Sport Fiesta.

The impossibly handsome and cool (almost pro skier!) Mikkelsen ended up in a fierce scrap for fourth on the final day – with characterful fellow Norwegian, Mads Øst-

berg. There was little to sepa-rate the two. But, after a cou-ple of errors and one fifth gear spin that almost saw Andreas off into the woods, the young talent faded and finished fifth – both Norwegians no doubt aided by the Citroën’s of Rob-ert Kubica and Mikko Hirvo-nen crashing out... WRC2

champ Kubica twice!Speaking after his amaz-

ing victory, Sébastien Ogier said: “It has been a perfect year. This is our first win here – it’s really amazing and I’m so happy. Once again I give a big thanks to the team, the car was just perfect. We had a great battle with my team-mate which was special and I’m really happy. It’ll be a hard challenge to keep the title next year but that’s the aim.”

And Jari-Matti Latvala said: “I am a bit disappointed as I won this rally in 2011 and 2012 – of course I wanted another one. The speed was good but there were too many little mistakes over the four days. I need to work on my rhythm for next year as it’s not there sometimes, but it has been a good weekend.”

So, VW and Ogier made WRC history with their amaz-ingly quick, super sorted Polo R – looking the business, with its boxy edges and smart livery and sounding fab. Job done. Onto 2014 now... can anyone touch them? Maybe Hyundai’s new i20 will with Neuville? One thing’s for sure... it’s great to have such talented new blood in WRC.

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roll with it

As if further proof were needed WRC drivers are more skilled be-

hind the wheel than F1 driv-ers, this year’s 2013 WRC2 winner, Robert Kubica made the point crystal clear on his WRC debut with Citroën – rolling out of Wales Rally GB not once, but twice! Ouch!

To be fair, he did have a new co-driver to get used to as well as the DS3 WRC, but still... not a sparkling debut!

On top of this, Mikko Hir-vonen also violently crashed out – filling his DS3 WRC with Welsh mud in the process!

Thankfully and rather ironi-cally for Citroën, their tarmac ace, Dani Sordo brought some relief to the French marque, topping two stages – but he still finished well down the order in seventh, behind the privately run machine of Martin Prokop. Mmmm.

Not a great day in the of-fice for anyone in the Citroën camp here at Wales Rally GB. Zut alors! Bring back Loeb!

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In WRC2, local hero and rising WRC talent, Elfyn Evans (son of ex-WRC

driver, Gwyndaf Evans) shone on his home event – blitzing to a maiden WRC2 victory and impressive eighth overall, much to the delight of all the many Welsh/British rally fans.

Impressively, he won WRC2 by over a minute from Jari

Ketomaa, with popular Brit Mark Higgins getting 3rd. Elfyn Evans said:

“It’s a special feeling to win here. To see so many Welsh flags waving out there is incredible. It’s been an amazing learning experience at M-Sport and I want to thank everyone for the op-portunity. The car has

just been amazing and it’s brilliant to win our home event. We’ll just have to see what happens next year.”

In 2012, Elfyn secured the FIA World Rally Champion-ship (WRC) Academy title, the R2 title in the British Rally Championship (BRC) and the UK Fiesta Sport Trophy. WRC calling...? We hope so!

Good evans!

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co-driving goldMerrick Stages, Rally Yorkshire,

McRae Stages, Cambrain Rally, then a Wales Rally GB class win... in under 10 weeks. Go Amy Williams!

co-driving gold

gorgeous, gregari-ous, gold-medalist, Amy Williams MBE is

our sort of thrill seeker. Two months ago, the Skeleton bob Winter Olympian hadn’t ever done any motorsport – now she’s a class-winning co-driver on one of the world’s toughest rallies. Ace!

The sassy gal (with the right surname for Welsh rallying) has just assisted Sky Sports analyst, Tony Jardine to his best ever result on Wales Rally GB – in the pair’s Kum-ho-shod ProSpeed Mitsubi-shi Evo, which finished 1st in Class 3 and an ace 26th overall. That is one hell of an achievement. Bobble hats off to the pair of them!

Amy Williams said to ROAD on Twitter during the event “I think I will be sad when this is all over! Although I’m shat-tered! One day to go!” And as the event drew to a close, she told us about leading their class: “Awesome result, to-tally unexpected!”

And as the class winners

got their Champagne at the finish, Amy said: “It’s been an unbelievable few days. It has also been crazy and really tough, but I’ve honestly loved every minute of it. The plan was always to get to the finish and we’ve made it! I’ve really got the bug for rallying now – I absolutely love it. I’m gob-

smacked at how well we’ve done. It’s probably one of the hardest things I’ve ever done, but I’d love the opportunity to do it again.” Yay!

We’ll second that – what an ambassador for rallying and what a great gal; rising to the rally challenge, and great driv-ing Tony. R-E-S-P-E-C-T!

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We soak up the WRGB atmosphere at the new Kinmel Park RallyFest – proving a huge success with the crowds.

One of the new features of the re-vamped, all-new Wales Rally GB

this year was the addition of ‘RallyFest’ stages. Designed as “family-friendly special stages at unique locations, providing a wide range of facilities and entertainment not traditionally found in the forests,” the RallyFest stages were run at the infamous Sweet Lamb in Powys on Friday, the stunning National Trust Chirk Castle on Satur-day and Kinmel Park near Conwy on Sunday (not used as a stage since the 70’s).

With easy parking access, the RallyFest stages suited

rally newbies and families alike. And the trade stands, historic rally car displays by Slowly Sideways, catering, live bands and large screen TV’s and commentary (from rally TV ace, Jon Desborough at Kinmel) created a superb, accessible atmosphere – re-ally close to the WRC action – and went down a storm with us, and those we spoke to.

Kinmel Park is a stunning place to watch the rally action – in glorious oak parkland, in front of a dilapidated old hall, with views down to the sea. And we really enjoyed wandering around the Slowly Sideways cult cars – Lancia

rally fest

rally fest

Delta S4, Metro 6R4, Colin McRae’s Focus WRC and an Escort Cosworth WRC – picking up WRC merchan-dise, listening to the live mu-sic and getting ready to rally with the TV screen action and enjoyable commentary. We then revelled in the WRC buzz, followed by the (two and three-day) National Rally that ran alongside the WRC – featuring crowd-pleasing Mk1

and Mk2 Escorts, Imprezas, Evos, 205 GTi, 911s, Talbot Sunbeams and even a few Freelanders: Big cheers!

My rally virgin family really enjoyed RallyFest. And even as a hardened rally fan – used to seeing WRC cars at full chat on the fast, flowing For-est stages – I loved the re-laxed, fun, RallyFest vibe... inspiring future Ogiers. Bravo!

Subaru might not be in WRC anymore, but the brand is synonymous with rallying. So, for our trip to Wales Rally GB, we tested the £31,495 Outback Lineartronic

2.0 Boxer Diesel – featuring a new CVT automatic transmis-sion (£1500 more than the manual). And it’s ace: The new gearbox is perfectly matched to the 148bhp, 350Nm, tor-quey, punchy, 45mpg diesel Boxer engine. Add in Subaru’s legendary Symmetrical All-Wheel-Drive and the Outback’s raised ride hide and you’ve got the perfect car to go trekking across fields and up Welsh muddy lanes in. And with comfy part-leather heated sports seats, climate control, 17-inch alloys, sliding sunroof, Bluetooth, reversing camera, auto lights and wipers... it’s a fab road tripper too. Read a full test in our Subaru special of Road, out in early 2014.

rallyrecce

ENJOY THEPERFORMANCE

NEw

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