S1 RST TRACK CAR

Evolving over twelve years of ownership, Nathan Rea’s S1 RST is a stripped-out performance machine with a clubsport vibe…

Old-school RST is ready to tackle the tracks of Europe.

Today’s market for 1980s RS Fords is more buoyant than it’s ever been, with collectors buying up tidy RS Turbos and RS1600is to sit alongside the Ferraris and Lamborghinis in their hermetically sealed private collections. So turning a Series One RST into a stripped-out track car might seem like a bit of a mad thing to do these days… although when you weigh up the pros and cons, the car we have here makes perfect sense for two key reasons: firstly, Rallye Sport Fords were built for hardcore use and abuse, it’s right there in their DNA. And

secondly, this car hasn’t been gutted and chucked together on a whim; Nathan Rea’s been working on this for twelve years, perfecting and honing and refining until it was able to make its track debut at the Nürburgring. Forget your speculative investments and your concours pernicketiness, this is an old-school RS in the traditional style.

“Funnily enough, I wasn’t really into cars back when I was a kid and these things were new,” Nathan ponders. “I grew up with my dad always tinkering with his Capris, V6 engine swaps and the like – and with the usual XR3i and Orion ownership amongst his Capris, there was always tinkering on weekends down the garages. But out of me, my brother and sister, I was always least interested in the cars… especially after the ‘thumb stuck in the car door’ incident!”

The less said about that the better, we imagine, although by the time Nathan got to the age of sixteen he was finding his feet, burying his head in Redline and Max Power and hankering after a Mk2 XR2. “I began collecting interior strip lights and all sorts of trim,” he recalls. “Luckily that car was never really on the road before we