Top Five Rock Cars

5. David Coverdale's Jaguar XJ

 

I must admit that when I first saw the video for Here I Go Again age seventeen I didn't actually notice that there was a car underneath Tawny Kitaen.

But, yes, as in all the other Whitesnake vids of the era, there is. And as David Coverdale, the lad from Yorkshire who joined the biggest rock band in the world before making it even bigger with his own band, never forgot where he came from it's a British motor.

Or two British motors actually, one white and one black. I used to think was some sort of symbolism. Not so. The video director just had a black one so he parked it next to Coverdale's white version and then asked Tawny to do her stuff. The result was a vid that helped push a song, that had previously only managed #34 in the UK charts on a previous release, to a Billboard #1.

The hair and the spandex have dated, but the cars haven't. Over here the big cats have a reputation of being a bit of an Arthur Daley motor and they aren't particularly practical on narrow roads. My little Metro ragged off a few. However even I'll admit the XJ is something of a classic design.

It not really recommended that your girlfriend dances in your lap whilst driving one though. I'd like to think Tawny was just playing around for the cameras, but as in 2002 she was arrested for kicking her then husband, Cleveland Indians player Chuck Finley, whilst he was driving, maybe she wasn't. He filed for divorce immediately afterwards and the Chicago White Sox played this song at the stadium next time they played the Indians.

4.  John Lennon's Rolls Royce Phantom V

 

How we missed the symbolism at the time.

When the hippest of the Fab Four bought a Roller and got artist Steve Weaver to paint it in the style of a Gypsy caravan it seemed that the counter-culture had stormed the bastions of the British Establishment.

It took punk to remind us that they had in fact become the Establishment.

Lennon, a wife beater who spent most of his post-Beatles career as a heroine addict, wrote some decent songs, but also appears to have lost touch with reality along the way.

Imagine is a great song, although a rather ironic one for funerals as who really wants to see the coffin of their loved one disappear behind the curtain to the words "Imagine there's no heaven." However in the video Lennon appears to have missed that he was singing "Imagine no possessions" whilst playing a $40,000 piano and wandering around his multimillion dollar mansion.

3. ZZ Top's Ford Eliminator

 

Few cars are more rock 'n' roll than the Ford Model A Coupe, the 'Little Deuce Coupe' of the Beach Boys song. Always a popular choice for making into a Hot Rod, the Eliminator is custom job done for ZZ Top frontman Billy F Gibbons by Don Thelan's Buffalo Motor Cars. The inspiration was the car driven by Martin Sheen in the film The California Kid.

They named their eighth album after the car and, along with the beards, the car had a starring role in the vids that accompanied their new grungy with a four-on-the-floor beat sound. The result though was a car that, although fully drag strip ready, spent more time posing than performing. 

2. Jan Berry's Corvette Stingray

When is comes to cars many artists talk the talk, but few walk the walk. Even fewer walk the walk and walk away.

Rock car crashes are tragically too numerous to mention them all. Marc Bolan died in a friend's Mini 1275GT, which, with only 57bhp probably gets the unfortunate prize of least powerful car to kill a celebrity. The prize for the most complete rock car death though must go to Whitesnake drummer Cozy Powell who died whilst doing 104mph in bad weather in his Saab 9000. Whilst drunk. And not wearing a seatbelt. And talking on his mobile phone. His last words were "Oh shit".

Jan Berry was half of a fifties double act that is surprisingly uncheesy. They liked their cars, and one of their songs was Dead Man's Curve,about a race between a Corvette and an E Type Jaguar that ends in both cars off the road.

Two years later Jan Berry was cruising on Sunset Boulevard, not far from Dead Man's Curve, when he too lost control of his 'vette and totalled it. He lived, and was back on the road a year later and lived to the ripe old age of 62.

1. Keith Moon's Chrysler Wimbledon 

Or was it a Lincoln Continental, or was it a Rolls Royce, or did it even happen at all?

This is the car that Keith Moon allegedly drove into a swimming pool in the ultimate act of rock we'll-pay-someone-else-to-clean-up-the-mess-'cos-we're-so-rich excess.

Numerous versions of the story abound. One has a drunk Moon trying to make a getaway from a police raid on a rowdy birthday party in a Lincoln, letting the handbrake off the car and having it roll backwards into the pool. In another version it's a Roller and in another the pool is a muddy pond at Moon's house.

Roger Daltry, who only admits to seeing the 450,000 bill for removing the car, says it was the Chrysler Wimbledon and an ornamental pool at a Holiday Inn in Flint, Michigan. As this is the nearest we've got to an eye witness, we'll go with that story.

In the picture the Wimbledon is the old timer to the right of the 246 Dino in this picture. As you can see Mr Moon has also pranged the Ferrari, allegedly after changing into first gear at 100mph.

But then, what is a rock car if it's in one piece. Some musicians, like Pink Floyd drummer Nick mason, whose collection includes a Ferrari F40 and a Lancia Stratos,look after their cars. Many musicians of that generation now look after themselves. Even Rik Wakeman has given up the booze and fags these days..

But what's rock 'n' roll about that?

Tragically Keith Moon did more damage to himself than to his machines and followed his Ferrari to the great party in the sky in 1978, after an overdose of prescription medication.

My Top Six Car Songs

6. Grey Cortina by Tom Robinson

A Cortina?

Well, of course. Tom Robinson here shows that, like charity, lust begins at home. I didn't grow up leering at Ferraris and Porsches in glossy magazines, but at the grubby Ford Capri's and Escort GTs up our street.

Not many Cortinas were actually grey, they were more a sort of one-shade-off-primer type of cream, and even fewer had twin exhausts. But whiplash aerials were essential, as otherwise they tended not to last too long as jealous little boys would bend them for you.

Jealous adults tended to do rather more than that. As Ford only ever had about three keys cut for their whole range stealing one was easy. In one year almost half the Cortinas in Belfast were stolen, which Ford claimed was because the thieves appreciated the performance and comfort.

Apparently Tom Robinson did eventually achieve his childhood dream and own a grey Cortina, only to have it written off after one day before he even got to a "2 4 6 8" Motorway.

5. MGB GT by Richard Thompson

It's hard to pick any particular theme from the songs of a writer and performer with a career as long and eclectic as Richard Thompson, but generally speaking whilst people are often suspect, machines are usually okay. He eulogised the Vincent Black Lightning motorbike in a song which, if this was a list about two wheeled machines, would be up there with Steppenwolf's Born To be Wild, Brigette Bardot's Harley Davidson, Arlo Guthrie's I Just Want To Ride My Motorcycle and Jasper Carrot's Funky Moped.

No, not really. The Bardot song is rubbish.

However we are staying on four wheels here, so instead of the 140mph Vincent, we have a song about a car that struggles to put a ton on the clock, but is slightly more practical.

The main interest here is Thompson's guitar playing, but with passing references to the Sunbeam Alpine, Triumph TR4 and an Austin Healey it's clear Thompson still longs for the classic British rag-tops of his youth. As a rally fan I'd have preferred a song about the Mini Cooper S, Lotus Cortina or Ford Escort Twin Cam, but I don't really mind MGBs, as long as they haven't got those hideous 1970s bumpers.

4. Red Barchetta by Rush

It's 1980 and the world in recovering from the second big oil shock. Meanwhile Canadian rockers Rush record this song.

Here we have their trade mark Ayr Rand inspired Libertarianism (although unlike Rand, Rush kept their drug consumption under control and never had to survive on Medicare) and sci-fi inspired lyrics, in this case the short story A Nice Morning Drive by Richard S. Foster.

In that the outlawed vehicle the hero uses to frustrate the officious and anti-car authorities is another MGB, but Rush decided instead to change to what many regard as the most beautiful Ferrari ever. A looker, sure, but it's hard to imagine a Barchetta starting up first time after a decade or more in a garage in real life.

The idea of a car as a symbol of individual liberty is all very well too, but if you want to write a song about the egalitarian nature of a car owning society, a Ferrari isn't really the best metaphor is it? Let Them Drive Barchettas - as Ayr Rand might have said.

3. Little Deuce Coupe by The Beach Boys

Car songs by The Beach Boys are always good for a laugh.

Not only can they not pronounce 'coupe' correctly, but amongst the virtues of their Hot Rod is something called a 'four on the floor'. This sounds pretty cool, but it actually translates as a four speed manual gearbox. Even my dad's old Lada had one of them.

They also go on to say that when they accelerate 'it's hard to steer', which does suggest something fundamentally wrong with the car. It's not something you usually read in a sales brochure, anyway.

Still, you don't drive a car like that for the handling, and you don't listen to the Beach Boys for meaningful lyrics. Maybe they were just a Barber's Shop Quartet with guitars, but these songs from before Brian Wilson blew his mind on LSD have a certain naive charm.

After that I guess he didn't drive so much.

2. Mercedes Benz by Janis Joplin

They say irony died when Henry Kissinger won the Nobel Peace Prize, but it was well and truly cremated when this song was used to advertise Mercedes Benz.

I'd always listened to it as a pastiche of consumer society; someone asking God for a car, a TV and a round of drinks, so either I missed something or people really don't listen to lyrics any more.

Joplin didn't even own a Mercedes, she had a  Porsche 356, like the one James Dean drove, only psychedelic. Mercedes in the sixties were cars for people who found Volvos too exciting.

Not that there's anything fundamentally wrong with them. They did do stylish and sporting as well as solid and dependable, like the "Pagoda" model pictured. But speed was always hand in hand with safety and sound engineering, so if there's a car that is at ninety degrees to the live-fast-and-die young ethic of rock, it's a Mercedes.

Also, if you wanted to find a performer whose style reflected the precision engineering of the Daimler Motoren Gesellschaft you wouldn't really pick the gravel voiced Janice Joplin, who sounds more like an old Trabant running without any oil.

1.Dead Man's Curve by Jan and Dean

It wasn't just the Beach Boys who had trouble with corners. Judging by the profusion of roads in America featuring a bend called Dead Man's Curve, the entire country seems to have a problem with anything curvier than Kate Moss.

(I should hastily add here before I am flamed from across the pond that one American at least has figured out how to make his car go round corners)

They even made a TV movie in the seventies called The California Kid, in which an evil Sheriff bumps off reckless drivers by making them take a corner too fast. The bend in question was a gentle right hander a Morris Marina could have taken flat, so I thought frankly they all deserved what they got - which sort of spoilt the film a bit for me.

(Note to my American friends - this, guys, is a tight corner.)

Jan and Dean may look squeaky clean to us today, but in their day they were pretty far out and according to rock critic Dave Marsh they should be regarded as proto-punks.

This song is generally considered to be about the one on Sunset Boulevard. It was written for the boys by Brian Wilson and is about a Corvette Stingray driver who has a race with Jaguar E Type which ends in them both failing to negotiate the titular corner. I can only assume the Jag had bald tires or was going twice as fast, as it had far better handling than the 'vette.

You'd have thought Jan and Dean would have learnt the lesson of the song and driven something with decent roadholding, but no, just two years later Jan Berry was trundling around Beverley Hills in his own Corvette, not far from Deadman's Curve, when he lost control and totalled the car.

Miraculously he survived, although it took him a year to recover, and he lived to the ripe old (by rock star standards) age of 62.

The crash may have wrecked his car, but it did the duos career no harm at all and they were still performing into the new millennium.

The accident certainly made the duo infamous, but hopefully rock stars acting out their own songs won't become a habit. I wouldn't be too bothered if Morrisey really was miserable now or James parked their behinds for a moment, but not only would be it be rather gross if Dexy's Midnight Runners did that to Eileen, but do we really want Liam Gallagher to live forever?

Given The Works

How fast were the classic rally cars of forty or fifty years ago?

They certainly seemed pretty quick to little me as I watched them flash past, but then I had nothing to compare them with apart from my dad's Lada.

Contemporary rally guides list brake horsepower and sometimes power to weight ratios, but these only give comparative figures and you can't rely on manufacturers figures anyway.

What I really wanted to know was how they compared to the cars I knew, or at least knew about.

Could Bodie and Doyle see off an Opel Kadett GTE in their Capri? Could James Bond outdrag a Sunbeam Lotus in his Aston Martin? And could my favourate rally car of all, the Lancia Stratos, compare at all with the world's fastest road going Ferrari?

Fortunately for us the magazine Autocar tested these cars and between 1965 and 1982 they rigged up their fifth wheels and recorded in minute detail the performance of these rallying beasts.

These figures from these tests come with some fairly major caveats though.

Firstly Autocar usually got the cars after a major rally, so the vehicles could well be a little tired.

Secondly taking off from a standing start is not natural for a competition car with a close ratio gearbox. First gear tends to be quite high, as a car club colleague found out when he tried production car trials in his rallying Skoda, and unless you get some wheelspin the engine is usually off cam once the clutch starts to bite.

A better test would be 30-70 or similar, but as 0-60mph appears to be the universal benchmark of performance, so these are the figures we'll use.

Here they are.

1967 BMC Mini Cooper 1275S - 9.7 sec
1969 Lancia Fulvia 1-6 HF Coupe - 9.6 sec
1967 Ford Lotus Cortina Mk 2 - 9.4 sec
1970 Datsun 240Z - 9.0 sec
1971 Alpine Renault 1600S - 8.8 sec
1965 Austin Healey 3000 - 8.2 sec
1978 Opel Kadett GTE - 8.0 sec
1968 Ford Escort Twin Cam - 7.9 sec
1971 Ford Escort RS1600 - 7.0 sec
1980 Saab 99 Turbo - 6.4 sec
1976 Ford Escort RS1800 - 5.9 sec
1978 Fiat 131 Abarth - 5.8 sec
1979 Triumph TR7 V8 - 5.2 sec
1981 Vauxhall Chevette 2300HSR - 5.1 sec
1980 Talbot Sunbeam Lotus - 5.0 sec
1981 Opel Ascona 400 - 5.0 sec
1982 Audi Quattro - 4.9 sec
1978 Lancia Stratos - 4.9 sec

The first question that leaps out from these figures is, how did the Mini Cooper and the Alpine Renault ever win anything? Mainly due to good handling and better teamwork rather than grunt, as you can see. 

In many ways these figures don't tell us anything we couldn't have guessed from the rallies themselves, namely that rally cars got a damn sight faster as the seventies progressed and that the Startos and Quattro were PDQ.

You also see what an amazing machine the Austin Healey 3000 was. It was rallying's first homologation special, and despite limited suspension travel which meant bumps were usually absorbed by the sump guard and the drivers bottom, it could probably have still been a winner in the early seventies if its various special tweaks hadn't been outlawed by rule changes.

The Opel Kadett was tested in Group 1 form. Although hardly a standard road car, it's notable that it still beat the top flight sixties machines.

It's interesting to compare these cars though with the top road going cars Autocar tested at this time.

The 3 litre Capri, which was the car every Old Spice wearing seventies man wanted, managed 0-60 in 8.6 secs, which is well behind the top Group 4 cars. To get equivalent performance we need to look at the supercars that Autocar tested.

In 1977 they clocked the Aston Martin Vantage doing 0-60 in 5.4 secs and the next year they gave the Ferrari 512BB a spin and it managed 0-60 in 6.2 secs, which makes it slower than all the rear wheel drive Group 4 cars.

Seeing as how the Ferrari has a nearly five litre engine, you may wonder where Enzo was going wrong when his top car can be ragged off at the lights by a Ford Escort.

Admittedly, being a road car you could make it faster by stripping out the cladding, stereo, jacuzzi and whatever else they fit to Ferraris and Aston Martins (probably a drinks cabinet), but to make it a rally car you'd have to add a roll cage, fire extinguishers and lots of under body protection so you'd probably be back to where you started from.

Equally you can tune the engines, but then you can do the same for the rally cars. By narrowing the power band up to 20bhp more could probably be wrung out of those engines, but that would make them virtually undriveable on a special stage.

You get the answer when you look at the top speeds. The Escort is geared out to 120mph, which is actually pretty fast for a rally car. This "lets the trees whip past quite quick enough for me" said Roger Clark. The Ferrari meanwhile was peddled at 163mph by the Autocar team and the Aston Martin was estimated to be good for 170.

In other words there was nothing wrong with the either machine, they're just  designed for something different. The rally car is just optimised to race to 100mph whilst remaining as small and light as possible.

However as any drag racer will tell you, the real test of a car is not 0-60, but how fast it can do the quarter mile.

Now these figures too come with a caveat. With the low gearing used on rally stages many of these cars were getting to their maximum revs in top gear and in the case of the Lotus Cortina it had actually red lined. The TR7 V8 was also being tested without a fifth gear, which probably didn't help.

Anyway, here are the quarter mile figures.

1967 Ford Lotus Cortina Mk 2 - 17.1 sec
1971 Alpine Renault 1600S - 17.1 sec
1967 BMC Mini Cooper 1275S - 16.8 sec
1969 Lancia Fulvia 1-6 HF Coupe - 16.7 sec
1978 Opel Kadett GTE - 16.3 sec
1970 Datsun 240Z - 16.0 sec
1968 Ford Escort Twin Cam - 15.9 sec
1965 Austin Healey 3000 - 15.6 sec
1980 Saab 99 Turbo - 14.8 sec
1971 Ford Escort RS1600 - 14.7 sec
1978 Fiat 131 Abarth -14.6 sec
1976 Ford Escort RS1800 - 14.5 sec
1980 Talbot Sunbeam Lotus - 14.0 sec
1981 Opel Ascona 400 - 13.9 sec
1979 Triumph TR7 V8 - 13.7 sec
1981 Vauxhall Chevette 2300HSR - 13.7 sec
1982 Audi Quattro - 13.7 sec
1978 Lancia Stratos - 13.5 sec

The main gainer here is the Triumph TR7 V8 which, once it's tires had stopped scrabbling for grip, was reeling in the opposition and I suspect if they'd run a race over 500m would have come home the winner. But also look how fast the big Healey is, nipping at the tail of the late seventies cars.

It's also interesting to see the Ford Escort and the Fiat 131 so close together. They were on the stages too, but that was generally assumed to be because the Fiat had better handling but the Escort the better engine. The Autocar team pretty much agree on this too, but the stop watch doesn't appear to show much difference at all.

However the supercars were also catching up by now, with the Ferrari also recording a 13.7 sec quarter mile and the Aston Martin bettering that with a straight 13, beating even the Stratos.

But as in rallying the co-driver very rarely gets to say "straight 400" this doesn't really matter. On real roads, rally cars are still the ultimate.

The History of the British Open Rally Championship: 1984

Blomqvist had beaten the Brits handsomely in 1983, but for 1984 he was away on a campaign that would see him become World Champion in the Ivory Coast in October.

Instead, Audi sent the reigning World Champion, Hannu Mikkola, to contest the series. Also in a Quattro was Malcolm Wilson.

Wilson had been developing a new car for Ford, a rear wheel drive turbo charged Group B car using an Escort Mark Three bodyshell. Ford though had realised that you couldn't win now without drive to all the wheels and had abandoned the project and gone back to the drawing board.

This left Wilson without a team, so he bought Stig Blomqvist's 1983 series winning machine and formed his own, learning the skills that he would use fifteen years later to run the official Ford team.

Up against Audi was the works Opel team of Jimmy McRae and Russell Brookes, using the two wheel drive Manta.

With the demise of Vauxhall that, unfortunately, was that in terms of  Works teams. Quality not quantity. Group A was also looking fairly quiet, with Per Eklund in the Toyota Corolla the only factory driver starting the series.

The series started, as usual, in a chilly Yorkshire with the event formerly known as the Mintex, but now called the National Breakdown. On the icy stages Mikkola's Quattro walked the event, but behind him in the fog McRae, Brookes and Wilson had a good tussle. McRae caught a glove in his harness on the first stage and spun, punctured in Wykham and needed an axle change, but still managed to finish ahead of Brookes. Wilson couldn't keep up with the Mantas on his Quattro debut and retired whilst lying fourth.

Group A meanwhile was not the expected walkover for Toyota. Eklund's Corolla was headed for most of the rally by Mikail Sundstrom's Sunbeam Ti. The Talbot left the road once and broke three gearboxes, the last one failing mid-stage and stranding the Finn.

However the event was overshadowed by the death of Escort driver Hafsteinn Hauksson in Dalby. Treeless Iceland's leading rally driver, he had had to overcome a phobia of driving in forests to compete in Britain, so his death was both tragic and ironic.

The rally circus next grouped at Easter for the traditional blast around the Emerald Isle, the Circuit of Ireland. Mikkola and Eklund were tacking the Safari, so German Harold Demuth took over for Audi and Juha Kankkunen - another future World Champion - sat in for Eklund. Up against the Toyota was the new Rover 3500 Group A car driven by veteran Mini and Imp man Colin Malkin. The Rover was far too big for the narrow lanes, but it offered oodles of tail out grunt and was an instant hit with the fans. The Irish petrolheads also got to gawp at Henri Toivonen in the Rothmans Porsche. The Finn was desperately unhappy in the team, but you couldn't tell from his pace.

The opening stages provided drama a plenty. Brookes suffered prop shaft failure on the first stage, McRae suffered brake problems and went into a field on stage two, Toivonen left the road on the third stage and Malkin retired on the fifth stage. The Rover had more power than the Group B Mantas and its back axle couldn't cope. By the end of the season the Rover engineers were reduced to a device to spray washing up liquid on the tires to reduce mechanical strain.

All this left McRae the surprise leader, but his car was only running on three cylinders and steaming like the Flying Scotsman and he was soon out. Demuth also suffered engine failure which left the local boys Billy Coleman and Austin McHale battling it out in their Mantas. McHale took the lead on the last day only fir his engine to go bang, leaving Coleman as the sole surviving works driver and winner by a country mile. Second was privateer Ernest Kidney and third Hot Rod World Champion Davy Evans in his first ever rally.

Normality was resumed on the Welsh. Brookes took the lead on the Epynt tarmac, but once the rally reached the forests Mikkola's Quattro took over. McRae's Manta was still causing him problems. It overheated, then wouldn't stay in gear. Trying to make up time he crashed and squashed the exhaust. He then did it again and injured his hand. He dropped to sixth but managed to climb back to fourth, behind Malcolm Wilson, helped in part by Anterio Laine's sick Quattro holding up the rest of the field.

It was the dust and midges of the Scottish next. Mikkola and the Quattro led from start to finish again, but behind him the three Brits battled it out. Wilson's Quattro was fastest, but he suffered suspension failure. Brookes then took over second, but he left the road for twelve minutes handing the runner up spot to McRae, who for once had a trouble free rally.

It was back across the Irish Sea for the Ulster Rally next. Mikkola was away in Argentina, so double World Champion Walter Rohrl drove the works Quattro, which appeared to have shrunk in the wash. This was the debut of the Audi Sport Quattro, and it blew the opposition into the weeds. Austin McHale had a major accident on the third stage, so second place ended up being contested between Brookes, McRae and Irishman Bertie Fisher.

An spot of Irish rain put Fisher off the road, and so it was Brookes and McRae scrapping for second place. Seconds separated the two Manta, but in the end McRae overshot a junction and had to concede the position to the Englishman. Just fourteen seconds separated the two Opels in the end.

The crews went into the Manx then with Mikkola on 45 points, Brookes on 44 and McRae on 42. It was all to play for.

Rothmans had intended to send Toivonen in one of their Porsches to contend the event they sponsored, but he had injured his back in the 1000 Lakes and so Kankkunen once more made an appearance in the series.  Eklund, who had walked the last three rounds in Group A now again faced opposition from the Rover Vitesse, this time driven by Tony Pond.

Brookes took an early lead and after stage four was looking reasonably comfortable. The Porsche's engine had failed and Mikkola's gearbox had jammed, leaving only McRae to beat. The Andrews Heat for Hire Manta then punctured on the next stage costing Brookes three minutes. McRae took the lead and decided attack was the best means of defence. The Scot set a series of fastest times. Brookes put his foot down to reel in the lost time, but overcooked it at the Tholt-y-will bridge and crashed out of the event.

McRae led Bertie Fisher home by more than ten minutes to take both the rally and his third championship. Third place was Tony Pond in the wheel spinning, tail out Rover.

Brookes was once again the bridesmaid, but he'd enjoyed his first year with the Opel Manta. Next year he'd be back.

The History of the British Open Rally Championship: 1983

British fans had two questions at the start of the 1983 British Open: could anything beat a Quattro in the forests, and could anyone take the title from McRae? The answer to one of these questions was yes and the other no.

There were a few changes to the field for '83.

Mikkola was absent, off to become World Champion. Instead the Quattros were to be driven by Swede Stig Blomqvist and Finn Lasse Lampi. The Stig was a rallying exile. Sweden had got so fed up of Quattros winning all their snow and gravel rallies they'd banned them, so he he'd come over here instead. The clever men in Stuttgart had also been fettling their machines, and the Quattro was no longer such a dog on tarmac.

Opel had been busy too, although problems had delayed the homologation of the Manta 400 and they'd have to start the season with the old Ascona. The new car, when it arrived, promised more power - but less driveability - and a better weight distribution thanks to an engine pushed as far back in the bonnet as it would go.

Vauxhall though were still where they were three years ago, and still using thirteen inch wheels, but at least the old Chevette HSR was reliable.

Once again it was two wheel drive versus four wheel drive. The Ulster had been added to the series, to make six rounds and the extra tarmac would help the two wheel drive cars, but a 'best five' rule would allow the temperamental Quattro a free breakdown, which could even things up.

That was about it for the top line entries, but Group A was now an interesting class. Per Eklund was now in a Group A Corolla 1600GT , and the rear wheel drive car would face opposition from Fords Escort RS1600i driven by Malcolm Wilson and Louise Aitkin. Harold Demuth's Audi 80 Quattro would eventually be homologated into Group A too, but had to start the year as a Group B car. Privateer Chris Lord in the Mazda RX7 would also be contesting this Group.
 

The opening round was once again the Mintex. It started on the Otterburn tarmac and for two stages Russell Brookes's Chevette was the leader in the fog. However once the rally hit the fast Yorkshire forests Blomqvist took the lead in the Quattro. The weather perplexed the organisers, but when the chaos was sorted out Blomqvist won comfortably from Jimmy McRae's Opel, and Eklund was a surprise third ahead of Brookes and Demuth's 80 Quattro.

A Quattro winning on gravel though was not news, however a Quattro leading on tarmac was, and that's what happened on the next round, the Circuit of Ireland. In fact Blomqvist wasn't just leading, he was walking away with the event. Nearest rival was Pentti Airikkala, who was driving by far the most interesting car to appear in the series, at least in my opinion, the Lancia 037 Rally. British fans had seen the car in the previous year's RAC - or at least most of them had, I'd been in bed with a bad cold - but this was its first appearance in Ireland.

The Easter traffic was as bad as ever, and when Blomqvists gearbox broke his service crew were stuck in it and he had to retire. This gave Airikkala the lead in the Italian supercar, but he was finding the mid-engined car tricky to handle. His first encounter with the scenery dropped him him to third, but his second put him out.

The man who inherited the lead was Russell Brookes. Three times winner McRae had had a troubled run, but he still had to hold off Irishman Bertie Fisher in another Ascona before he could claim the win. The Scot's hold on the rally had been broken and it was starting to look like it might be Russell's year.

In Group A Eklund and Wilson retired and Chris Lord managed to hold off Louise Aitkin to claim the win.

The Welsh was next, and finally Opel had the Manta 400. in due course this would become one of the best rear wheel drive rally cars ever, but on debut it understeered terribly and McRae struggled, eventually only managing sixth. This left Brookes to take on the Audis. he beat Lampi, but Blomqvist had disappeared into the distance and won by nearly eight minutes.

In Group A Eklund and Wilson battled it out, with the Toyota a comfortable winner.

The action then moved north of the border for the Scottish which, rather than being hot and dusty, was cold and wet in '83. Blomqvist cruised to an easy win, but behind him Brookes and McRae tussled for the runner up spot. The Manta was starting to work properly now and in the end it all came down to punctures. The Chevette and the Manta both punctured on stage 28. Brookes had to stop and change the wheel whilst the Opel was able to struggle to the end of the stage, which gave the Scot second.

Eklund, meanwhile, won Group A by twenty minutes as the opposition fell apart.

It was back to the black stuff again for the Ulster Rally, but any hope that this would allow the two wheel drive cars to head Blomqvist were soon dashed. The Swede was again unbeatable. McRae had a troubled rally with the Manta. At one point the heater caught fire, and on another stage he had to stop to let petrol fumes out of the car. He must have wished for his old Ascona back.

Brookes's Chevette was running fine though, although the driver had 'flu. He spun on stage 5 but only lost thirty seconds, and was hanging on in third, unable to match the pace of Irishman Bertie Fisher in his Manta. Blomqvist had transmission problems, which briefly put Fisher in the lead. Brookes's co-driver Mike Broad put in a complaint that Audi had serviced the car illegally, but it was rejected. Instead Blomqvist soon regained the lost time won the rally by over a minute.

This left Blomqvist on 60 points to 53 for Brookes. Due to the 'best five' rule, to be champion, Brookes had to win the last round outright and Blomqvist not score at all. So it was all to play for on the Rothmans Manx.

As Rothmans also sponsored the series and the Opel team, they sent along a brigade strength squad for the event, consisting of Ari Vatanen, Henri Toivonen and Jimmy McRae. These three were soon leading, with the young Finn just ahead of his older countryman. Brookes was fourth until a puncture on day two cost him two and a half minutes, and dropped him to seventh, just behind Blomqvist.

McRae ended an unhappy year when the Manta's axle gave out, elevating everyone a place. The Audi engineers then turned the Quattro's boost up to eleven and Blomqvist started moving up the field with Brookes right behind. The Quattro was third behind the Opel pair, when it started stage 44 out of 49. Brookes was following and could see the Audi across Druidale when "Suddenly there was a mushroom cloud of oil smoke - it was like an atomic explosion." With a piston sticking out of the side of the engine block Blomqvists championship was over.

There was now the possibility of GM giving the Opels team orders to let the Chevette past. Brookes had asked before the rally what would happen in this situation, but he denied actually asking for the Mantas to be slowed. "I would not have wanted to win the rally that way," he said in 1983, although he'd clearly changed his view by 1989......

Eklund won Group A from Lord's RX7. He'd wrapped up  the championship in Ulster but his seventh overall put him fourth in the overall championsip. This was a nice result for the Swede after two years of driving unreliable and slow Celicas.

Russell Brookes though was disappointed to be runner up. He had scored in every round and said "I have driven harder, faster and better in 1983 than I have ever driven before." He had beaten McRea for the first time since the Scot had moved up to driving top level cars. After two disastrous years with Talbot and a troubled debut with Vauxhall, he was now back at the front of the field and would challenge for the title in every year for the rest of the decade.

But for Vauxhall Chevette this was the end, at least as a Works car. Conceived, rather optimistically, to win the 1976 RAC Rally, the Chevette had indeed been a 'better Escort' but had now run out of development. Airikkala had driven one to win the 1979 Open, but every other year had been a disappointment. We fans, though, loved the tail-out Chevette and its disappearance from rallying was another nail in the coffin of the ailing British car industry.

So it was a Swede who was British Open Champion. Not that we minded too much. We knew Stig, you see, and had been following his exploits since he'd won a particularly snowy RAC Rally in 1972. Besides, Stig could make the Quattro dance, he was the only one who could. Years of chucking overweight Saabs around the forests and rallycross tracks had given him car control second to none and for the first time we could see an Audi sideways.

He was far and away the quickest Quattro driver of them all, and Audi were starting to realise this as well. Two months after his engine blew in the Isle of Man he won the RAC Rally, and for the next year Audi gave him a shot at the world title. He took the opportunity and ran with it, and became the 1984 World Rally Champion. Like Vatanen three years before, the Open had been the springboard to the top of the tree.

This just showed what an important series the British Open was.

Blomqvist 60 points
Brookes 57 points
McRae 47 points
Eklund 34 points

The History of the British Open Rally Championship: 1982

Fire up the Quattro, it's time for action.

1981 had been fun, but it had all been a bit insular and provincial. True, the World Champion that was (Walter Rohrl) and the World Champion to be (Ari Vatanen) had both popped by, and there were a couple of Belgians on the Manx, but all the drivers battling for the series had been British resident even if, like Pentti Airikkala, they weren't British born.

However for 1982 that all changed. The world and his wife came to battle it out on the Open. The last round of the series, the Manx, featured seven A Priority Drivers, that is, drivers who have won a World Rally or the European Rally Championship in the last three years or finished in the top three of a WRC round, or the top five of the ECR, in the last twelve months. Jimmy McRae was British but the other six, Ari Vatanen, Hannu Mikkola, Guy Frequelin, Henri Toivonen, Stig Blomqvist and Per Eklund, weren't. One was the World Champion, two of the others were future champions, one was a future multiple European rallycross champion  and another was die whilst the fastest rally driver in the world. It was a stellar cast.

But we are getting ahead of ourselves. The series started, as usual, in a chilly Yorkshire with the Mintex, and leading the field away from York was Mikkola in the Beast from Stuttgart, run by our own David Sutton. Vorsprung durch Masses-of-Grunt-and-Grip, the Quattro was like something from a different planet in 1982.

However in these days of bang-bang devices and clever differentials it's hard to explain just how dull four wheel drive and turbo charging was when it first arrived on the rally scene. The Quattro was quiet, and it braked and accelerated in a straight line.  Apart from the speed at which it could accelerate out of a slow corner, it did not look like a rally winner.

Looking more like the real thing was reigning champion Jimmy McRae, still in an Opel Ascona 400 but now part of the Rothmans team, along with 1980 RAC winner Henri Toivonen. Russell Brookes was still sponsored by Andrews Heat for Hire, but had ditched the unlucky Sunbeam Lotus for a Chevette HSR. Vatanen was in a black MCD Escort and Per Eklund was getting ready to have another go at making the Toyota Celica competitive. The man left standing when the music stopped was 1979 Open Champion Pentti Airikkala. With no works drive, he bought himself an Escort to compete.

On the opening round though, it was the Quattro that was the car to have, and Mikkola led from the off and started taking ten seconds a stage off everyone else. Behind him the others were struggling for grip. The Finns though seemed to be having the better of it. Vatanen and Airikkala battled it out through Yorkshire, with Pentti getting his private Escort ahead of the David Sutton machine only for steering failure to end an inspired drive. Toivonen took over the chase and closed the gap when Vatanen's engine went off song in Dalby forest.  Seconds separated the Finns as they went into the final sprint around Oliver's Mount, but on the Scarborough tarmac Toivonen's Opel was quicker and he snatched second place.

Leader of the home drivers for most of the rally is National Champion Terry Kaby. McRae has a slow start but gradually rose up the field to finish fourth. It had been a poor showing for the home team though and the Scandinavians had totally outclassed them.

Fortunately the next round was rather better suited to home grown talent and two wheel drive machinery. The Circuit of Ireland was five days of blind tarmac rallying round Ireland. There is nothing like it today. The Rothmans Asconas shot into the lead, but Mikkola was floundering in the big Audi. They weren't totally invincible it seemed.


McRae led, then Toivonen, then McRae again. Then Toivonen left the road and climbed a bank. Damage to the car was minimal but he's broken a bone in his wrist. Carrying on would be painful, but carry on he did. Vatanen then took up the chase, the World Champion pedalling the Escort as hard as he could, but not making much progress against McRae. Mikkola's Quattro was snapping driveshafts and David Sutton was reduced to pouring Coca Cola and then flour into the gearbox to prevent clutch slip. Brookes had been delayed early on by electrical problems but was now charging up the field.

Vatanen looked like he might just steal a win until he took a yump too fast and damaged the Escort, dropping him right down. Brookes had fought his way up to second, but a brave Toivonen held on for third but Mikkola was down in sixth, behind a pair of Irishmen. It was Jimmy McRae though who won, making it a hat trick of Irish wins for him.

For the Welsh though Mikkola was absent as Audi had sent him to the Tour de Corse, a decision they probably regretted as Mikkola's steering failed before the first stage. The real world also threatened to interrupt the rally, as it was feared that the army would want the Epynt ranges, which made up half of the rally, to train for the Falklands War.

In the end the rally went ahead without trouble, Walter Rohrl had said an "educated monkey" could win in a Quattro, but in the end Audi chose a different sort of primate for the event, the 1979 World Champion, and 1977 RAC Rally winner, Bjorn Waldegard. He vaguely remembered Epynt from an RAC a few years back, and was soon proving that Quattros could go well on tarmac. The Swede, who in his time had rallied everything from a Lancia Stratos to a Mercedes 450SLC, led from the off and took a comfortable victory.

Behind him there was chaos. Vatanen took a wrong turn on Epynt and was excluded whilst on the last blast through the tarmac McRae tool a "95mph corner at 100" and totalled the Ascona. Team mate Toivonen took second and the series lead whilst Stig Blomqvist, in a Talbot Sunbeam Lotus, was third.

It was back to the forests again for the Scottish Rally, and with Mikkola returning another Audi walkover was expected. But that wasn't what happened.

Instead the Quattro broke its steering arm - again - on the first corner of the first stage. Mikkola managed to get the car off the stage in reverse, but he'd lost nearly eight minutes and was dead last. Vatanen was leading, chased by Blomqvist and the two Rothmans Asconas, but Mikkola was after them. The Quattro overtook Malcolm Wilson to lie fifth by half time at Aviemore.

As they raced through the northern forests Vatanen retired with a broken driveshaft handing the lead to Blomqvist, who then retired with head gasket failure. Mikkola overhauled Russell Brookes, then Toivonen and then finally leader McRae. He won in the end by a massive ten minutes, but he'd done it the hard way.

So it was all to play for on the Manx, three days of pace noted tarmac stages with an A list cast. McRae needed to win the rally to retain his Open title, with Toivonen, Mikkola and Brookes all in with a chance if he didn't.

On the first day though, it is the Finns Vatanen and Toivonen who were dicing for the lead whilst Terry Kaby led the home challenge. Mikkola was again struggling and didn't make the finish, and both Talbots expired with engine trouble on the same stage.

Toivonen lost the lead when he punctured, but regained it when Vatanen crashed after a yump. Toivonen then has electrical problems, allowing McRae into the lead. With the car fixed he took off in pursuit of his team mate, only to crash out of the rally. This left McRae with a comfortable lead over Brookes, which he held to the end.

So it was the part time heating and plumbing engineer from Lanarkshire who was champion. The best drivers in the world had come to the British Isles to try to take the title off him, but had failed. The Scot had had a good year, also winning rallies in Belgium and Ireland and coming second in the European Rally Championship.

But whilst a Brit may have won the Drivers award, every round had been won by a German car, With a series that featured two tarmac, two mostly gravel and one 50/50 rally, the battle between two wheel drive and four wheel drive had been fascinating. Had Mikkola skipped Corsica and gone to Wales he may have won both the rally and the championship, but that wouldn't have stopped Opel taking the manufacturers prize. The Ascona 400 had shown it was the perfect car for the series; a reliable all rounder. The Quattro had proved unbeatable on gravel, but too complicated and unreliable for a series where every score counts.

Audi would be back though, and next time the British boys wouldn't find it so easy.