Rallying’s Roots, Muddy Roots
Elemental excitement

I’ll take a punt and say that most people reading this probably haven’t run a rally stage. Not properly. Not at full tilt. How about spectating at one? Even a national stage rally? Or a sprint? Still not that many, I’d predict. Yet how many people love the idea of a rally car?

You can all put your hands down now.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

Yes, I’m confident that there aren’t many people who don’t love rally-stye machinery, whether or not they’ve donned an anorak at some stage. How could you not? For every iconic picture of a racing car or exotic supercar, they’ll be several more of a rally car doing something dangerous, frightening, gravity-defying or a combination of all those things – likely whilst facing in a seemingly inappropriate direction.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

This month’s theme on Speedhunters is dedicated to the cult of the rally car and how that crosses over to the street in both style and substance. We’ll be looking at cars that have been either heavily influenced by or are directly descended from that gene pool, but first I wanted to look at some of the background to the sport. It’s the ideal perfect reason to picture a whole load of the cars that have become icons of the automotive world.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

It’s difficult to make a rally car look boring. I’m sure it’s clear to regular readers that I love circuit racing, and long endurance races in particular. But even I can find myself drifting off at races around sterile modern tracks, where the acres of run-off keep us fans at a distance.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

You want up close? Go to a rally.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

It’s not just about what rally cars do, but how they do it. There’s something glorious about rallying that draws people to it.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

Perhaps it’s the purity of it all. There are the natural locations normally used – the great outdoors as you find it, in whatever conditions might be prevailing at the time.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

There are the cars, which are often subjected to an absolute beating and still expected to make it to the end of a stage, and at dizzying speeds.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

There’s little superfluous about a rally car. It has to be fast, sure. But it has to be strong. It has to survive.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

Then there are the drivers. Rallying requires different things from a car, but even more from a driver. There are legends of Formula 1 and other top level motorsport series of course, but the big names of rallying exist on a different plane of appreciation.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

Even if you’ve never seen a rally car at full tilt whipping through the trees, I’m sure you’ve seen TV footage, and what the drivers do without blinking is downright terrifying to mere mortals like me.

Let there be rallying…
The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

When did rallying start? Well, off-road competition has always been part of the spirit of driving: you could say that rallying as a sport goes back to the dawn of the automobile. Without pushing it too far, the reality is that the first car races were held on tracks over which today’s sports car drivers would just start openly weeping. Even one of the most famous tracks of all, Le Mans, was originally a white-knuckle ride over a 65 mile lap of packed gravel and dirt for the first 20-odd years of its life. The pit straight was only 12 feet wide. Race or rally? I’d say the latter.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

Epic long-distance rallies like the Monte Carlo and the challenge of events like the Coupe Des Alpes set the scene for the post-war explosion in rallying’s popularity. Point-to-point races against the clock; a driver (or two) and a car versus whatever was ahead. Day or night. Rain or shine. It’s an enduring concept that has never really needed changing. Oh, and just add a jump wherever possible.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

Cars came before highways – and even now, there’s a thrill you can get from turning off the tarmac and heading into the unknown.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

Driving on the loose is such a different experience to anything else. Sure, if the weather is bad during a track day then the changeable conditions can be a challenge, but that’s nothing compared to being properly – and deliberately – off-road.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

Even slithering around a muddy field can be a good introduction to what’s involved. Many years back, I remember being stuck in a muddy field at Glastonbury with a hire car. How to get out? Boot the throttle! The car’s relationship with grip was tenuous at best – the whole car felt like it was floating, requiring rapid and continuous corrections to maintain direction.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

It was hardly tackling the Finnish forests or Australian jumps I know, but seriously, it made me appreciate what might be involved. But what would it be like to get out to a rally proper?

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

This last year has provided several opportunities for me to finally get a bit closer to the action and scratch that rallying itch – before 2013 I would have been one of the people to admit that I’d never driven or been driven on a rally stage, or even attended a top level stage rally. Starting off with the gateway-drug of a sprint at Race Retro at the beginning of the year, I then moved up to the harder stuff: a passenger ride with Robert Barrable in an S2000 Skoda Fabia on the Goodwood Festival Of Speed Rally Stage, and then back in July there was the Eifel Rallye in Germany.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

My appreciation turned to serious addiction again.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

The Eifel Rallye is an annual historic rally held in the western edge of Germany, not a million miles from the Nürburgring. It’s an international gathering of rally fanatics, and the perfect place to see a good fifty-plus years of rallying history in the flesh.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

Rallying’s roots are laid out before you, all-access style, with the town of Daun and its outlying villages turned into rally central for a weekend. Knowing we had a rally theme in the diary for Speedhunters, I’ve been holding onto the shots from that event, as I knew they’d provide the perfect archive to call on as background for this story.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

Well over 150 cars spanned 55 years of stage competition. The main service park in town overflowed from the market square and down all the arterial streets and parking areas; even a stroll around here would have satisfied most people.

The Eifel legends
The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

The event was celebrating 40 years of the World Rally Championship; the first season back in ’73 was won by the diminutive Alpine A110.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

Though entrants in the Eifel stretched even further back, with the rules relaxed to allow a bumper line-up – the oldest car was a Wartburg 311 Coupé from 1958. Modified production cars like that have been the predominant base level of rallying for pretty much the sport’s entire history.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

Of course, there was one era that was a major exception to that rule… But more of that later.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

That’s another of the great things about rallying: you can throw pretty much anything at the gravel. Where there’s a will there’s a way, even if the will is a whale. Who thought a Citroën DS could be a sensible rally car?

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

Or a Mercedes now I think about it…

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

And a Porsche? A 911 at that? (This one was actually being driven by legendary driver Walter Röhrl himself, who was also honorary patron of the event).

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

But that’s the thing: so many manufacturers have entered rallying at one stage or another (pun intended). Like nothing else except perhaps endurance racing, rallying has always been the ultimate test of the automobile.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

If you want to build a reputation, reinvent the brand or just turn around bad press, throwing a car at the mud has always brought almost sure-fire status.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

Just look at the brands who have completely turned round public perception of their product over the years: Audi, Saab, Subaru and more. Slow, boring and agricultural reputations respectively were transformed.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

At the Eifel Rallye, 31 different global car brands were represented, which is a hell of a big number and shows how important the sport was – and still can be.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

A fair percentage of the cars taking part on the Eifel stages are in completely original spec – warriors from stages past, still brought out to battle. This gives us the perfect way to show off an example of a complete lineage of rallying heritage.

Live lineage
The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

Sometimes it’s an entire marque which becomes synonymous with the mystique of rallying. Lancia for instance – the Italians ruled rallying for a while.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

Model after model was aimed at the loose, and for two decades, owning a Lancia was a sign of being a ‘Real Man’. Oh for the current Lancia management to look back to this glorious period and realise the horror of their current range…

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

The oldest Lancia model was represented by a pair of svelte Fulvia Coupé 1600HFs, one from ’72 and one from ’74.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

A pair of original – and it’s not often you can say that – and one rebuilt Stratos represented the quantum leap that Lancia made mid-decade with their spaceship wedge.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

The Stratos was one of those game-changers that in a way pre-empted the Group B monsters of the following decade: a custom-made weapon, a homologation special.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

The Beta Coupé also made an appearance during the same period; what a stark contrast.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

As the years go on, so the numbers of representatives increase: a trio of brutal 037s were run out, all originals.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

Their skeletal, almost model-kit appearance seems un-Lancia-like, but these were built for effect, not beauty.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

The next evolutionary step for Lancia was the equally iconic Delta Integrale (a quartet were at the Eifel).

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

The more boxy saloon returned to superficially production-based roots, but was actually just as crazy as those before it, if not more so. A T-Rex in wolf’s clothing.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

Other times manufacturers concentrated on a specific model, as with Ford and the Escort.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

Throughout the model’s life (and on with its successor, the Focus), the Escort was identified by the man on the street with its success on the stages. It’s been the same thing with the Impreza and Evo in more recent decades.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

Then there’s rallying as a place to showcase technology. Naturally there’s an obvious example, and it begins with ‘Q’.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

As with the Delta Integrale, with the Quattro you didn’t have to pretend that your street car was a rally monster – it was a rally monster.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

14. That was the number of Quattros at the Eifel, through Sport, A1 and A2 models to the 200 and the 80, with a third genuine vintage competitors.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

When the Ur-Quattro emerged from the primordial swamp it killed everything in its path. Group B had arrived, and changed rallying forever.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

Alongside four-wheel drive came turbos: previously unheard-of grip mated to savage quantities of power.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

Evolutions came thick and fast – cars became outdated within a year. And the public loved it. Danger included, what was there not to like?!

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

The blisteringly fast, technology-laden cars are still an amazing sight. But then, in context any car on a rally stage looks pretty amazing. Any car you’re looking at will be (should it be driven appropriately) the most awesome sight you’ve seen – until the next car passes. And so on.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

It’s unlike any other event: you trek to a find an optimum viewing spot, watch the cars hammer by for a bit, then pack up and find your way to the next stage. You live the event alongside the competitors, taste the same conditions and feel part of something. Gravel will still be in your skin the next day.

The 2013 Eifel Rallye for historic rally cars

You can see the concentration on a driver’s face. You want to drive that car. So has the world fallen out of love with rallying? I don’t think so really. In the modern WRC, things are still shaky but it wouldn’t take much to put rallying back where it belongs: in the spotlight. So, let’s see where the Speedhunters ‘rally roots’ theme takes us…

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1

I still remember watching WRC in TV way-way back. I was disappointed that Mitsubishi's car didn't look like the road going VII. It was more like a prototype. I still cheered for them though. Can't forget Loeb and Solberg as they were my favorites back then. It was also the first time I saw brakes glowing red. It was on a Ford Focus in a stage with tarmac in it. I loved watching them in TV.

2

What I love about rally cars are that they all must be road legal (Check the number plates on most of these cars)... The drivers need to actually drive their cars from one stage to another (with a special permit for that particular event. No need to go faster than 200kph/124mph... You could drive this car on a public road
You can't do that in a touring car or any other track based race car though...
Check this out... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-t6g0y9-xYw

3

I hope you know I expect features on Mk2 Escorts and good things like that, yeah?

4

Great post!  It's great that Speedhunters can devote some screen time to the original form of motorsport.
Regardless of peoples favourite motorsport "genre" none of them would exist without rallying.  It's the purest form motorsport.  Man, machine and elements.

5

Rallying? A Sepultura reference? Count me in!

6

RacingPast Its true: I was sat outside my flat one night talking with friends and we had about six "classic:" group B era cars sat at the traffic lights opposite us... its the happiest I've ever been at 5 AM

7

Searching "rally" on speedhunters only brought up about a dozen results for 2013, and that is why I rarely visit here.
Why only post Group B nostalgiac when there are rally events happening weekly around the world?

8

A month of rallying on Speedhunters? This I'm REALLY looking forward to.
With regards to the cars, I'm as in love with a lot of the modern WRC machinery as I am with the older rally cars (though if I had a choice, I'd rather an older car in my garage!). I do think its a massive shame that the distance between WRCar and showroom model seems to be widening.
Look forward to seeing what content you guys come up with!

9

A lot of my passion for cars and motorsport comes from rallying. Whether it was rallycross at Brands in the 80s or Group A and early WRC, it's all there in the memory. Such good times. Hopefully the sport gets back to those days sometime.

10

tbtstt Not a month, just a couple of days!

11

PFULMTL We would love to do more rally events but there are only so many of us and we can only be in so many places at one time. 
I would happily spend a year following the WRC around in the name of Speedhunters :)

12

P1 Race Photography To be fair, I think the sport is still awesome, but its presentation and media coverage leaves a lot to be desired.

13

PaddyMcGrath I had the same thought. I quickly went to the comments hoping someone else caught it too.

14

PaddyMcGrath Oops. Apologies, I read "this month's theme..." as "a month"!

15

This has to be one of my favorite posts ever!

16

Please, Please find a 22B to feature! and a rally 911 :)
also here's a thought about the media exposure, with the remote locations it is much harder to televise these events, but with the increase in tech and specifically drone tech do you think we may see a return to proper media coverage? i mean for the cost of on helicopter for arial shots could they not run several drones for that wonderful media coverage? maybe a couple years away but if someone in the know with the ability to do this can, please do! this is some of the most exciting racing i have ever witnessed!
ill be heading to Bancroft this weekend :D

17

mmmm Lancia.
Honestly most of my rally love is for the old stuff, up until Group B.  I honestly prefer seeing a bunch of RWD (and occasionally FWD) plain-jane cars tearing up dirt roads.  Hope to see a feature or two on those!

18

MatthewCase PaddyMcGrath Me too , rooooooooooooots

19

When Colin McRae died part of childhood died with him.

20

Man, no Delta S4 again? I would like the rarest rally car ever. I'm glad Speedhunters in finally giving a good spotlight on rally. I feel like it's easily the biggest motorsport worldwide but there's rarely coverage of it anywhere. Hopefully it'll start to show up more common here too!

21

Rally month...  posts by me incoming! Can't wait!

22

EricSeanDelaney  They posted the Delta Integrale.. there could be an S4 coming.

23

some of my favorite photography is from the sport of rally, looking forward to your features, this gonna be good!

24

Been to Germany, GB and France for WRC events as a spectator. And lot's of national events (Netherlands & Belgium) both as a service mechanic and spectator. Took some time of now back supplying parts to teams. 
But in 2014 will be back in the service area at national events helping a friend running his car!
Loving this feature! Makes me want to go to a lot more events next year!

25

Great post Jonathan - some really stunning pics in there. Goddammit I want to go in a rally car round a stage now. I think... :)

26

SuzyWallace Whilst writing this up, I may have accidentally bought a voucher for a rally driving course. Oops.

27

racingparadise Excellent! Sounds like 2014 will be a great year then. I definitely want to get out to the forest more as well.

28

majik16106 EricSeanDelaney I think the S4 is worth a feature on its own... I'm hoping they'll be one at Race Retro. But then, I'm biased towards Italian cars in general, so I'd take any Lancia!

29

@Mike It's a tough one. I watched the highlights of the Rally GB WRC finale, and really was not enthused – and I'd so wanted to be. There's a fine balance between sweating the details and making it accessible, but personally I want the battle between drivers to be the focus, rather than just 'here's a 100 yard stretch covered by a single camera, aren't they fast' sort of thing... The drones are a good idea; each year in recent times there's been better coverage promised, but not delivered. Here's hoping 2014 steps up...

30

@BenD MatthewCase PaddyMcGrath Hehe... I revealed my Inner Self...

31

@DanKe I couldn't agree more!

32

aussieANON Ah, that's a tough one; in the spotlight feature that follows this one, I originally had a pristine MkII, but thought that it would be more interesting to put in less expected machinery... It was a difficult choice! But I know that we're more likely to feature Escorts as a matter of course... And you can guarantee they'll be here on Speedhunters in the future!

33

TarmacTerrorist RacingPast Amazing. That's exactly how I felt at the Eifel Rallye: it seems so wrong! A fantastic thing to see.

34

Jonathan Moore aussieANON To be honest I don't feel as if too many Speedhunters will know about the wonder of the Mk2. If you're not going to feature it, then just send me the pictures... Can never have too many pictures of them haha.
Love the yellow Mk1 that was up the other day. I personally would love to see more cars like that in future, built using blood sweat and tears and a whole lot of love, rather than just bolting on parts. 
Rally theme is best theme.

35

Wow good post! Now we need more pictures of that Nissan S12. Don't think you can slip one detail shot of it in and get away with it. How about a feature on it?

36
read the crash report

JDMDONG  
when Colin McRae died  the entire childhood and adulthood of 2 innocent children died at the same time..And as always, it is never Colin's fault...Must have been his co-driver's fault... Oh that was his neighbor.
Colin always was ready to blame everybody else. The engineers, the mechanics , the co-drivers...to use his frequently used word "Obviously!".

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