The History of the World Rally Championship: 1977

Andruet, Fiat 131 Abarth, 1977 Monte Carlo

1977: the birth of Punk and the WRC finally begins to rock.

The year began in familiar style. Munari's Stratos won the Monte, as usual, and a Saab won the Swedish, as usual, but then it started to get exciting. Lancia had been told to step aside and let Fiat go for the title, but whilst the other teams had generally let whichever team Turin favoured get on with it for the last three years, for 1977 Ford stuck their head over the parapet and had a crack at the title themselves.


Compared with the sports cars that had dominated the series to date, the cars that the teams would use looked comparatively ordinary. Front engined rear wheels drive cars had more or less been eclipsed by the minis and Porsches of the late sixties, but now they were back. The Ford had the better engine whilst the Fiat had the better suspension. Arguably neither car was yet as good as a Stratos, or a properly backed Porsche 911, but economics now decided that a rally car should look like an ordinary road car, even if what was under the skin bore no resemblance whatsoever to what you'd find at your local dealer.

This was a trend that would eventually see 500bhp turbo charged specials pretending to look like ordinary hot hatches, but even in 1977 if you wanted to turn your Escort Popular into an RS1800 you'd start by throwing everything away except the shell. At least Ford sold the bits to allow you to do this. Fiat for their part made up for their power disadvantage with increasingly specialist components only available to the works team and a few select privateers.

When it came to the drivers Fiat took to signing anyone who could win a particular event, sometimes even signing up former winners just to stop them driving Escorts. Ford meanwhile had a fairly stable team that one journalist summed up by the old Jaguar slogan 'space, grace and pace': the larger than life Bjorn Waldegard, the old stager Roger Clark and the young and reckless Ari Vatanen.

The key difference between the teams though was money. Fiat had a steamroller, Ford had a lawnmower. Rally regulations were pretty laid back inn those days so there was unlimited practise and almost unlimited servicing. Fiat arrived on the rallies weeks in advance and tested like mad on the actual stages whilst positioning a fleet of service barges across the countryside. Ford arrived at the eleventh hour and more or less made do. In the end though, this didn't make a lot of difference.

The duel began in Portugal, a tough rally in those days where the road sections were so tight that some teams even pace noted them. Waldegard looked to be running away with the event, but four punctures slowed him and let Alen's Fiat through. It had been close though.

Fiat didn't go to the Safari, but Ford did, and Waldegard survived the floods to win from Datsun and Lancia. The Italian team again failed in Africa as the white and green wedges turned into submarines in what was the wettest Safari on record. Next was Australia where Vatanen was fastest, but managed to crash no less than three times handing victory to Bacchelli's Fiat. The winning margin was less than two minutes, whilst Ari had lost 23 minutes on one stage alone.....

Ford got their revenge in Greece where Waldegard triumphed and Fiat transmissions failed.

The 1000 Lakes was next. Ford had decided to add local driver Kyösti Hämäläinen to their line up, an inspired choice as it tuned out. Finland has produced drivers who have conquered the world, on stages and on tracks, but Hämäläinen was the Finn who decided to stay home. A man who would regularly spend 3 or 4 nights a week practising, he knew the Finnish roads so well he could drive the event without pace notes. The result was a terrific duel with Alen which could have gone either way until a rock, possibly placed by an over eager spectator, took out the Fiat's sump after a hyppy. In Canada Vatanen again looked like winning but this time the car, not the driver, let Ford down allowing Timo Salonen made the score three-three.

Things were now very finely balanced. Ford were two points ahead, the difference between a first and a second place, and three rallies remained: two on tarmac and one on gravel. The wildcard was Lancia. Still technically an independent team, the Stratos was still the best car on tarmac and the team was due to enter the Sanremo and Corsica. If the championship went to the RAC Fiat may as well give up. Fiat took no chances. All the stops were pulled out for the next two events whilst Alen was sent to Britain to get some forest practice in.

When it came to rallying on the black stuff Ford were late starters: they didn't even use slicks until the 1975 Manx. Boreham did their best to get the Escort ready, lowering the fuel tank and fitting coil springs at the back but only had time to sort out the dry weather performance. Waldegard went well enough on the first day, but then when the sun set the rain came down. In the end he was beaten by three Fiats and a Lancia, with Jean Claude Andruet talking his first WCR win since the 1973 Monte. It's easy to feel sorry for Ford, but by this time they had been rallying the Escort for ten seasons and so really should have sorted out wet tarmac handling.

After that Waldegard didn't want to go to Corsica so instead Ford sent a young Russell Brookes and signed up local specialist Jean Pierre Nicholas.

Nicholas knew a priest who lived in the hills who could predict (or fix) the weather and with this spiritual help, and final drive that reduced the top speed to 90mph (and the fuel consumption to 6mpg), he set out to take on six Fiats and a brace of Lancias on the twistiest event of the year.

He nearly made it too. On the last loop out of Ajaccio he was third behind Darniche's Fiat and Pinto's Stratos. "Now I think I will attack" he said, but the car had other ideas. The back axle cooked itself and that was that. Fiat won the event and the championship, but it had been a damn close run thing.

Fiat didn't need to go to the RAC, but they went anyway, which at least allowed Ford to get a bit of their own back. Waldegard clinched a classic victory from a hard driving Hannu Mikkola in the uncompetitive Toyota Celica, meaning he had won three of the four most prestigious rounds of the championship.

Personally I was more interested at the time in the battle for the Group 2 up to 1300cc class, where the domination of Skoda and their little 130RS was challenged by the little French Renault 5 Alpines. Fortunately for Skoda the French hatchbacks didn't make it out of the forests and Skoda were to continue to be unbeaten in their class for the rest of the decade and most of the next.

Ford had out up a good fight. In eight outings they had won four rallies and had the fastest car on two other. Only on tarmac had the Fiats been quicker. However in the end they had been beaten by a team with more money that could afford to run six car teams and spend four weeks practicing for each event. 

1977 then belonged to Fiat and Waldegard's, but it was also rallying's greatest year and everyone was looking forward to 1978.

The History of the World Rally Championship:1976

The Battle of Waterloo may have been won on the playing fields of Eton, but the 1976 World Rally Championship was won in the boardrooms of Turin.

True, the Stratos was far and away the best rally car of the year. Lancia's main rivals, Fiat, spent the year developing their new 131 but only managed to get it to the finish once. But as Fiat owned Lancia they could have just asked the little team from down the road to stand aside and let them through.

Anders Kulland, Opel Kadett GTE, Monte Carlo Rallye

Fortunately they didn't and instead Lancia wrapped up their third title in a row in style. They took the top three places in Monte Carlo, the top four in Corsica and Sanremo and also took a victory in Portugal that gave an indication of what might have been if they'd been allowed to compete the previous year.

The Lancias didn't have it all their own way though. Accidents allowed Saab to reclaim the Swedish rally and Africa and Greece again defeated them, although in Kenya they came very close. The high drama though came in Sanremo.

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When they signed Bjorn Waldegard Lancia expected him to deliver results on the tricky Swedish and British rounds, snow and blind corners being something that southern European drivers aren't used to. What he wasn't supposed to do was displace Sandro Munari as the Stratos Numero Uno. The Stratos had literally been built around Munari, to the extent that other drivers had trouble physically fitting into the cockpit. Allegedly Lancia swapped Munari for the Stratos's Dino engine, allowing him to drive Ferrari sports cars on road races.

Munari in Morocco

So when at the end of the penultimate stage of the Rallye of Sanremo Waldegarde was four seconds Munari words were had. Swedes don't like being beaten, so Waldegarde responded by waiting for four seconds after being signalled to start the stage, then putting his foot down. He and won the rally by four seconds and then left the team to drive for Ford.
ahead of

Roger Albert Clark winning the RAC

The year ended with the RAC Rally. Once again a Ford won, but this time it was Britain's Roger Clark in his red and black Cossack car ahead of Blomqvist in the heavy Saab. It wasn't a classic event with crowd problems and an unpopular route, and the leader for most of the event was the young Finn Penti Airikkala. Fourth was a lacklustre Sandro Munari, once again finishing behind Waldegarde.
The car and driver were clearly capable of winning the event so what was the problem? A few weeks later the world knew the answer. Corporate politics in Turin had intervened again and Lancia had been told that it was Fiat who were to be given the chance at the title next year. Lancia had achieved their hat trick, but that was to be that.

The History of the World Rally Championship:1975

1975 started with a lot of promise.

The oil crisis was over and for once there appeared to be two teams eager to do battle over the whole series for victory. Lancia had the better car, but Fiat had the numbers. So it could have been a classic year, but alas it was not to be. Instead of a battle across the world on the special stages, the championship was decided in an Italian boardroom.

The first event of the year showed that the Stratos was going to be the car to beat. Leaving Renault Alpines and Fiats in his wake, Sandro Munari drove his green and white car to victory in Monte Carlo. The Lancia then showed its all rounder abilities in the next two rounds when, driven by Lancia's own Swede Bjorn Waldegarde, the Swedish rally was wrestled away from the Saabs, whilst only a failure of its Pirelli tires kept Munari's Stratos from first place in the Safari.

The Lancias failed in Greece and didn't go to Moroccan, whilst the Fiats missed the Acropolis and broke in Africa, where victories for Peugeot and Opel marked the further demise of the once all-conquering Renault Alpines. Battle between the Italian giants should have resumed in Portugal, but unfortunately politics got in the way.


Fiat had actually bought Lancia in 1969, but until now the brand was allowed to do its own its own thing. However Turin now decided that Lancia had had enough of the limelight and they were told not to go to Portugal. The Fiats walked to victory and only the mathematical chance that Renault Alpine could clinch the title allowed Lancia to go to Sanremo and Corsica. The Stratos reaffirmed its mastery on twisty tarmac and notched up two more victories.

The RAC, the final round of the year was the foggy RAC which was another Ford benefit with Timo Makinen's Allied Polymer Escort RS1800 narrowly beating Roger Clark's Cossack version. Most of the fastest stage times though were set by Waldegarde's Stratos. Victory was denied the Swede after the car stopped in the forest. Lancia mechanics got him going again, but without the car's rear bodywork. Servicing on a stage was illegal, and as well as having an immodestly displayed engine the car now had no brake lights, indicators or rear number plates, so exclusion was inevitable, but Bjorn's performance in the howling beast created another Stratos legend.

So the year ended with triumph for Lancia, although with the addition of fuel injection for Sanremo the Fiat Abarth's were now almost as quick. No other team seemed willing to challenge the Italians. Peugeot stuck to the endurance events, Saab to Scandanavia and Britain whilst Ford's tentative attempt at competition outside of Finland and the UK turned into a fiasco when the Dunlop tire truck broke down on the way to Sanremo. The Italians would appear to be going to have it their own way for a while longer.

The History of the World Rally Championship:1974

Lancia won their first World Rally Championship thanks to the Stratos, a solitary Fulvia and an oil shock.

The oil crisis decimated the WCR knocking out the Monte Carlo, Swedish, Moroccan, Polish and Alpine rallies - the last two never to return. The championship finally started in Portugal and was a walk over for Fiat. They must have thought it was going to be their year for whilst they skipped the Safari and couldn't beat the Escorts of Mikkola and Makkinen on the 1000 Lakes, they appeared to be the only team taking the championship seriously. Renault Alpine had thrown in the towel, Ford seemed only intetersted in doing British and Finnish rallies and Italian rivals Lancia had only managed a third place in Kenya with the aging Fulvia.


All this was to change in the next event. Although it was now October, the championship wasn't even half over yet, and so when Lancia wheeled out their new, purpose built rally winning machine in Sanremo there was still everything to play for.

The Stratos proved a winner straight out of the box and after success in Italy they sent Sandro Munari across the pond for the two North American rounds. He won the Rideau Lakes at a canter but on the wonderfully named Press-on-Regardless rally the car eventually conked out, a consequence of trying to do three rallies on the trot without a rebuild.


With a new car he managed a respectible third on the RAC. Timo Makkinen's RS1600 and Stig Blomqvist's venerable Saab 96 beating the Italian racer through the blind forest stages. The Fiat team though were hopelessly off the pace.

Lancia went into the last round in Corsica with a healthy lead, but a mathematical chance of loosing to Fiat. Munari's engine gave out, leaving Jean-Claude Andruet to take on the challenge of his former team mate Jean-Pierre Nicholas who was still driving for Renault Alpine. In the end the French team had to concede that the Italian wedge was now the master of the black stuff.

Lancia had their first crown. Winning with a car only homologated in October was a remarkable, and almost certainly never to be repeated feat. The Stratos legend was born.

1974 World Rally Championship for Manufacturers Results

The History of the World Rally Championship:1973

For the World Rally Championship 1973 was the beginning, but for its winners it was also an end.

For the blue Renault Alpine A110 cars which swept the board, with their great French drivers: Jean Luc Therier, Jean Pierre Nicholas, Bernard Darniche and Jean-Claude Andruet, this was their swan song. Never again would the team attempt a full world world rally program and whilst for each driver there would be more victories, they would from now on be bit part players.

The WCR itself was almost a championship in name only. Renault Alpine were the only team to take the thing seriously, the others just sending cars to events they thought they could win. This says a lot about the relative status of the rallies and the championship.

This was a championship for manufacturers, not drivers, and winning the Monte Carlo, Safari or RAC rallies could make a reputation. The championship was secondary. This meant that whilst Renault Alpine appeared to romp to victory, they actually faced pretty tough, if inconsistent, opposition on each rally.

In 1973 it was very much 'horses for courses' as far as rally cars went and the A110 was far and away the best all-rounder of its day. Pretty much unchallenged on tarmac, it could live with the Escorts and Saabs on the loose and survive a rugged African rally as well as a Datsun or a big Peugeot.

During the year factory cars were only beaten by Saab in the snow of Sweden (or more precisely they were beaten by Swedes driving Saabs - no foreigner had yet won their rally), by a BMW 2002 on the Austrian Alpine, by disqualification of the sole works car in Poland (the exact location of Eastern European Passage Controls appeared to be a state secret) and by a trio of Ford Escort RS1600s (and a Volvo) on the RAC. On the snow of the Monte Carlo, the gravel of Portugal, the dust of Morocco and Greece, and on the tarmac of Sanremo and Corsica they were untouchable.


Sadly though the little cars, which had been around for a decade by this point, had run out of development. No more could performance could be rung out of them and from then on the team only made selective appearances on the WCR. The Blue Riders rode off into the sunset and whilst French cars and French drivers would lift the title again in the future, it would 31 years before a French car driven by a French driver would win. That sort of thing means a lot in France.

On the trivia side the 1973 WCR featured the only rally in which a two stroke Warburg came second. This was Polish rally - its only appearance in the championship. 52 cars started and only three finished so the Wartburg actually came second to last. Last place, or should we say third, was a Polski Fiat 125p.

The winner was a works Fiat Abarth 124 and the winning margin was 2 hours and 47 minutes. A quick calculation would suggest that the Fiat was pulling away from the Wartburg at a rate of slightly over 20 seconds a mile so this probably wasn't the closest fought rally ever.

However this damp squip of a rally shouldn't take away the triumph of Renault-Alpine and their Blue Riders. The French would be back, make no mistake, but next year it was to be the turn of the Italians. But which ones?

1973 World Championship for Manufacturers Results

How It All Began

It was November 28 1976 when, aged six, my parents took me to a windy New Brighton to watch Special Stage 35 of the 1976 Lombard RAC Rally. The cars had spent the night battling through a lunar landscape in Kielder forest and were extremely late. Having got there early to get a good spot - vital if you want to see the rally and are only four feet tall, a rather cold little Martin was rather dischuffed when several members of the motoring press turned up at the last moment and stood right in front of me. Fortunately a few words from Dad quickly moved them on.

The notes scribbled on the entry list we had with us, which still survives, say that Penti Airikkala was first through in his Escort, then Roger Clark in his Cossack liveried similar car, then Stig Blomqvist in the black Saab 99. However I don't remember any of these, nor Billy Coleman's fourth placed Escort.

However I still remember the car that came through next: Sandro Munari in a white and blue wedge that made an incredible noise. I'd apparently been taken to rallies, races and autotests before but I'd howled, or filled my nappy or fallen asleep or all three and don't remember them, but I still remember my first encounter with the immortal Lancia Stratos, and in particular the music of it's 24 valve Ferrari engine.