Originally posted by Dutch4x4 in this post

Go Petter! :drive:

Guess it worked...

Originally posted by flyingscot in this post

Channel 4's rally coverage is well the pits. Burns and McRae and who ever takes their fancy at the front of the grid is all we hear and see. They seem to forget about the people below the top 5 or 6 in the rally or the manufactures championship. I mean we saw about 6 seconds of Hyundai that whole rally yet they came 7th and we saw about 8 secs of Skoda at the first stage and nothing there after dispite it being the Octavia's last rally and the fact at least one car was always in the top 10 until retirement, again which we didn't the retirement! I watch Eurosports coverage which uses the people from C4 but is much more balanced and enjoyable and doesn't seem to be a second thought wedged into the scedules. On Eurosport we saw the Toni Gardimiester hit the tree stump that put him out from in car and the Alternater failure of Didier

i have to agree c4 are the pits.

eurosport / motors tv are miles better!

And goodbye to the Octavia - after it's 111th WRC entry!

Best-ever result: Armin Schwarz, 3rd on the 2001 Safari Rally (so not one of those sissy let's-cut-the-number-of stages-in-half-and-do-them-twice events).

Dutch - agree to a certain extent but as a Kenyan national (born & brought up there), the 2001 event had lost some of its "hardness". We used to go and watch every year and the "old" version of the Safari, with the likes of Shekhar Mehta and Rauno Aaltonen, was brilliant for watching fully committed drivers going flat out on very dodgy roads where the pace notes were almost non-existent. Im still depressed about the scaling down of the Safari (and now it losing its place on the WRC calendar) as the the loss of the "worlds hardest rally" means we get more of super stage rallying in cars which are designed for short sprints rather than endurance and drivers who rely on intimate knowledge of the route rather than classy reaction drivers.

Best moment in rallying is still seeing Rauno Aaltonen/Lofty Drews in about 1984 driving an Opel Manta in the Safari - came round a corner on a very rough dirt track (ie bl**dy great ravine was most of the road) doing a speed about 2 times that of any driver, took off over a bump, hit the ravine on one side of the road and came flying past our family completely airborne at a distance of about 15 foot from our heads. My mother hated him from that point and always referred to him as that "idiot / loony" Amazingly he finished the rally as well :cheers:

I know im old and sad but still think that Waldegaard, Mikkola, Alen, Vatanen etc of that era (plus the two above) wre some of the most exciting drivers to watch and really knew their stuff.

Originally posted by KentStu in this post

I know im old and sad but still think that Waldegaard, Mikkola, Alen, Vatanen etc of that era (plus the two above) wre some of the most exciting drivers to watch and really knew their stuff.

your right.. its gone soft.. bit like f1.. i grew up watching Pond, Toivenen, Mcrae Snr, they had way more of the "right stuff"

Originally posted by KentStu in this post

Dutch - agree to a certain extent but as a Kenyan national (born & brought up there), the 2001 event had lost some of its "hardness".

Stu, alas it had, yes, but it was still a jewel compared to most other events.

Great memories indeed - and don't forget your other locals, like Mike Kirkland and Ian Duncan.

Waldeg

Suprised you know about Mike Kirkland and Ian Duncan (but forgotten Vic Preston Jnr ), In fact Ian Duncan was a family friend when we were still out there and he actually taught me to drive when very young (ie scared the hell out of me on his farm!)

A little article from the WRC website that was e-mailed to me that I thought you might appreicate.

Good night and thank you. . .

Cyprus

Thats a good article!

Originally posted by KentStu in this post

Suprised you know about Mike Kirkland and Ian Duncan (but forgotten Vic Preston Jnr ), In fact Ian Duncan was a family friend when we were still out there and he actually taught me to drive when very young (ie scared the hell out of me on his farm!)

Ian Duncan taught you to drive? :eek:

Of course I knew about them, Stu. Anyone half interested in rallying over the past few decades should. I mean, they shook up the establishment more than once!

Whatever happened to them?

A lot of the Kenyan guys are still rallying out there in the national championship and getting involved in various other autocross events etc. Ian Duncan is still rallying in the top 2 or 3 of the championship driving a Toyota Landcruiser :eek: - the Kenyan championship is a bit like the old Safari in that it is still a mix of speed and keeping your car in one piece!

Originally posted by KentStu in this post

Ian Duncan is still rallying in the top 2 or 3 of the championship driving a Toyota Landcruiser :eek:

So what's wrong with a Celica?

That was good enough for him to win the Safari with...

(Although Fabpreza might have something to say about the drivability of a road-going Turbo 4WD )

Originally posted by Dutch4x4 in this post

So what's wrong with a Celica?

That was good enough for him to win the Safari with...

(Although Fabpreza might have something to say about the drivability of a road-going Turbo 4WD )

A good rally car and I spent some happy hours bombing around the UK following the Lombard RAC Rally in both the GT4 and before it, the 323 4x4 Turbo Mazda when Mikkola and Timo Salonen were at the wheel.

And Yes, I enjoyed the Mazda more than the Toyota which was too heavy and the chassis/steering was too slow to react for me.

In fact, the Mazda was a cracking little car at the time - totally foolproof and had 'integrity'

I found some BBR and TWR tuning articles on the 323 the other day which brought the 0-60 to 6.8 and the 0-100 in 16.9 - In 1990. Like the RS Focus, only with 4WD

Now we are talking. I've been busy with "stuff" and just saw the Cyprus ralley on the sat TV. I was hoping the new Fabia would be in it. No luck. Just checked the Skoda-Auto site .... pretty sharp looking and the "size" looks right. I've always thought the old car was too "portly" to be a serious runner in these events. I'm hoping the new one runs much better. Awsome!! 315hp out of the 1.8 turbo... one can always dream.....

Originally posted by Silber_Igel in this post

315hp out of the 1.8 turbo... one can always dream.....

One can dream alright, the Fabia WRC engine is a 2.0T steaming out 300bhp.

Cheers,

FD