Motorsport: 14 rally greats take part in McRae event

Oct 2 2008 by George Topp, Hamilton Advertiser

OVER 50,000 fans from around the world thronged the Perthshire forests on Saturday as part of a unique tribute to Colin McRae.

A year on from the former World Rally Champion’s death, his own Coltness Car Club staged what one former international star described as “Scotland’s round of the World Rally Championship”.

Fourteen of the sport’s best-known drivers, including four former world champions, headed a 140-strong field tackling the Colin McRae Forest Stages Rally, the final round of the County Saab Scottish Rally Championship.

On Friday an estimated 2000 people watched the superstars being interviewed by Lanarkshire’s own motorsport journalist John Fife, during a two-and-a-half-hour forum.

The most star-studded motorsport chat show ever held in the UK, so many people wanted to attend that it was eventually beamed live to a giant screen outside the hall.

“This was a magnificent event, just like being on a World Rally Championship round,” said former champion Bjorn Waldegaard during a radio broadcast being beamed around the world.

The rally on Saturday, however, wasn’t without its dramas. Going into the last stage, Alister McRae was lying second behind Calum Mackenzie from Aberdeenshire, but the Lanark driver managed to move ahead and seemed poised to win the 2-wheel drive rally.

Unfortunately his dad Jimmy slid off the road on the last stage, and his Porsche plunged more than 50ft down a hillside.

Although he and his co-driver were uninjured, dozens of well-meaning spectators with no knowledge of the sport immediately rang emergency services.

They received so many calls they sent three fire units and an ambulance to the forest, and although event officials managed to stop the ambulance, fire-tenders found their way into the forest rather than via the rally start.

One then got stuck on the forest road for over two hours, forcing organisers to cancel that stage.

By that point the forest was thronged with thousands of spectators, including a bus-load of Welsh fans, all waiting to see the stars in action.

Cancellation of that stage dropped Alister to second in the 2-wheel drive event behind Cunningham.

Overall, the rally was won by Britain’s only current World Rally Championship driver, Ford star Matthew Wilson from Cumbria, in a Focus WRC.

The Metro 6R4 derivative of Andy Horne from Inverness finished second, Cunningham third, and Alister McRae fourth in his Escort.

Motherwell’s John Crawford had been posting good times in his Escort before his rally ended crashed against a tree.