For a bloke who – let’s see – 1) grew up in one of New Zealand’s rallying strong-holds (Gore), who 2) has made a career (of sorts) out of reporting on motorsport across the county as a whole, 3) has been doing the press and ‘PR’ for Peter Martin’s tarmac-based Targa rally events for the past 10 or so years and 4) has spent the past 12 years chucking an old rear-wheel-drive Nissan Skyline at the scenery at grass roots drift meetings around the North Island , you’d think I’d be a ‘big fan’ of traditional (i.e. gravel road) rallying.
Which I – sort of – am, despite never having given ‘rallying’ a serious ‘go.’
Even my poor, long-suffering wife Delia, asked me (one day many years ago now, and – as I remember it – completely out of the blue) why I had never ‘done a rally?’
Which is actually a very good question – particularly in light of the announcement last Friday that New Zealand has finally won back what in effect are the ‘southern hemisphere rights’ to run a round of the (in this case 2022) World Rally Championship from Australia.
An Auckland-based four-day Rally New Zealand event will start on Thursday September 29 and end on Sunday October 02.
It will be a New Zealand event’s 32nd appearance on the FIA World Rally Championship calendar and will come 10 years after the last WRC Rally NZ and two years after the COVID-19 pandemic forced the cancellation of what was to have been this country’s original return from the WRC wilderness in 2020
Couching Friday’s announcement in terms of it being a ‘major morale-boost to a city currently in Alert Level 3 lockdown,’ Rally New Zealand Chairman Peter ‘PJ’ Johnston said that he was “absolutely delighted to share this terrific news with rally fans and the wider community.
“We have worked so hard and waited so long for this moment. We got agonisingly close to having the WRC return last year before COVID interrupted and so this feels so rewarding knowing we will get to run one of the country’s most iconic sporting events once again.
“We are so grateful the WRC Promoter has decided to bring the championship back to New Zealand and can’t wait to get working on the finer details in the coming months.”
Johnston hailed the support from the SuperCity’s promotions arm, Auckland Unlimited as being key to getting the WRC back.
He also acknowledged the role of Motorsport New Zealand.
“It has been a true team effort securing this opportunity,” Johnston said.
Since a rally here was last on the WRC Calendar, increasing numbers of fans from around the world have tuned in to follow the action – the WRC now has a huge annual audience of more than 800 million viewers and billions of online impressions.
A fact not lost on Richard Clarke, Head of Major and Business Events at Auckland Unlimited.
“We are certainly excited about the opportunity to partner with WRC and our final agreement will deliver a diverse range of benefits for Auckland, as well as providing another exciting event opportunity for locals and visitors to enjoy Tāmaki Makaurau,” he said.
Which just leaves NZ’s premier rally driver Hayden Paddon and (wouldn’t this be amazing if everyone involved could make it happen!) last year’s inaugural Battle of Jack’s Ridge winner, Shane Van Gisbergen) to sort out competitive new-for-2020 hybrid/fossil-free-fuelled cars for the event.
Paddon, still the only driver from the southern hemisphere to have won a round of the WRC (in Argentina is 2016) has been named as the 2022 NZ event’s official ambassador.
But there is no way he will let it be a passive role.
“It has long been a dream of mine to compete against the world’s best here in my own backyard,” he said.
Me? Well. While there’s always been a latent kind of interest there, I’ve never really been in the right place to convert it into – let’s see – a properly prepped car, a suitably qualified and experienced co-driver plus a suitable noob’s (i.e., beginner-friendly) event to make my gravel debut in.
It’s the same set of reasons/excuses in fact, which have stopped me doing a season of TQ racing at Western Springs despite the dollars required being (considerably) less when I last enquired – 5/6 years ago — than when I first moved to Auckland (way) back in the day.
In saying all this rallying has actually given me some of my best all time motorsport moments. Proof in fact that your experience as a fan can be every bit as exciting and as relevant as that of a driver, co-driver, or mechanic.
One of my most vivid motorsport memories, for instance, came from the night back in the mid-70s (1976 sounds about right) when with a loose-knit group of car and motorbike racing mates we rode our trail bikes up Chittocks’ Hill (Mountain Rd) due-east of ‘town’ one Friday or Saturday night and sat through a miserable southerly change at around 12.30 or 1.00am to watch Kiwi co-driving great Jim Scott guide Hillman Avenger-mounted Scotsman Andew Cowan past us in what to us local turnip-eaters appeared to be suicidal speed ‘down’ the road ahead of a snarling, spitting array of howling, gravel spraying BDA Ford Escorts which would have included eventual runners-up Blair Robson & Chris Porter and fellow Kiwis, Jim Donald and Kevin Lancaster.
Written down like that it certainly ‘sounds’ like I know what I’m talking about. But to be absolutely truthful I didn’t have a clue what was going on. Bar of course the fact that the field headed down Mountain Rd instead of the more usual ‘up’ which the Eastern Southland Car Club used to use as a hill-climb course AND that the driver who most impressed me was the guy in the leading course car – a large, unwieldy LWB Toyota Land Cruiser station wagon – who, somehow managed to get the big, high-riding thing slowed down, turned and on its’ way again into and through the first drop-down left-hander (which looked like it had actually taken him by surprise) well before the next similar but even more steeply cambered downhill right-hander then ultimately out of view as he accelerated past the Chittock family’s driveway and on into the night.
While still living in Gore I’d also make a point of heading out of a Saturday or Sunday afternoon……to Waipahi to watch what must have been a precursor to the now rather famous Catlins Rally, and to nearby Conical Hills to watch the rough, tough Rankleburn Rally.
I even recall finding my way to a small forestry block north-west of Arthurton to watch then top Kiwi rally ace Mike Marshell and his long-time co-driver Arthur McWatt running in a local event to test out the potential of an alternatively fuelled (it might have been LPG!!) RS1800 MK1 Ford Escort.
As the years passed and I moved north, first for education, then work, I got to follow further international rallies. I well remember, for instance, being passed as I returned to Auckland from Helensville by a 4-door 2WD Ford Sierra rally car being hustled along at – at least 140-160 km/h pace – (and this was on a transport stage remember) by a young and precocious Scotsman called…Colin McRae!
The year would have been 1989 and incredibly McRae ended up finishing fifth overall against bona-fide WRC opposition in an era when 4WD platforms had been dominant since Stig Blomqvist won the WRC title back in 1984 in an Audi Quattro.
Speaking of which, when I was living in Wellington through the era of Audi’s Quattro revolution, a friend at the time followed the New Zealand round of the WRC every year as a member of a group called the ‘Lerts,’ with each member qualified to call themselves……A Lert…… get it, Alert!
Oh well, never mind, there was actually another reason I raised the subject of Team Lert anyway … My mate, who this time I will call Ari (because that is, in fact, his real name) told me once that in a fascinating example of ‘life repeating art,’ by the end of rally week all the young fellows following that year’s WRC, would be driving along, simultaneously blipping the throttle and dipping the clutch…… in an effort to replicate all the popping and banging of a pukka Audi Quattro rally weapon?
Which, if nothing else gives you an idea of the sheer depth of interest – nay, passion – out there just waiting to be tapped when an event of the size, the mana and the magnitude of a WRC comes to town.
Whether that will be me next year I’m not 100 % sure. What I do know right now however is that it takes me just over an hour (using a network of West Auckland backroads) to reach the outer edge of the Riverhead Forest, on my MTB…and last time I rode out that way and back out through the forest I recognised part of a stage I actually drove my car out to, parked literally kilometres way, then trudged the two or so kms back into the forest just to see who was quick and who….looked like a dick!
If the organisers use the same stages next year, I’ll ride my MTB out early, get in a couple of trails then settle back to be entertained by some of the world’s best drivers on one of New Zealand’s best ‘forest’ rally roads.
Because 46 years on from that night up Chittocks’ Hill I’m still obviously a fan. And 33 years on from witnessing a young Colin McRae seemingly defy the laws of physics in a fairly ordinary-looking 2WD Ford Sierra, I’m as interested as the next bloke to see – with my own eyes if you like – who the next ‘enfant terrible’ is going to be!
So, the only other thing I can say really, is ….bring it on!
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