WELCOME TO THE SPRING ISSUE!

Iremember, when I was growing up, Ford Escorts seemed to be everywhere. I mean, the older Mk1 and Mk2 models were getting on a bit even back then (but I still vividly remember watching plenty of Mk2s racing around the oval stock car tracks I was so fond of back then), but the Mk3s and Mk4s were commonplace, there were plenty of nearly-new Mk5s sat on car dealers' forecourts everywhere you looked, and you could even drive away from the local Ford garage in a shiny new Mk6 model.

That doesn't feel like it was that long ago, but where did all those Escorts go? Of course, I do know the inconvenient truth – rusty scrapheaps or traded-in as part of Scrappage Schemes – but it's amazing how something so 'everyday' can disappear so quickly. It's also surprising how much truth there is the old cliché about not knowing how much you miss something until it's gone. I mean these days, even the run-of-the-mill base spec Mk4 Escorts get more attention than the latest hot-hatches. Maybe not from the youngest generation, but anyone from their mid-30s onwards can't help but stop and stare as a wave of nostalgia washes over them.

And that's before we start talking about the XRs and RSs that really got our pulses racing back in the day. See one of those on the road today and I can't help but get all giddy as the 12-year-old Jamie comes raring to the surface.

I'm sure it's the same for many of you too, which is why we've put together this special issue of the mag. Of course, it's still bursting full of the same great fast Ford content you've to expect from the UK's number one Ford tuning mag, but we've stuffed in a load of extra pages to make this a bumper 148-page issue, and then packed it full of Escort greatness.

And with 2020 marking 40 years since the arrival of the new front-wheel-drive Mk3 Escort, we've hand-picked some of the very best bits to create our Mk3-Mk6 Escort special.

So, sit back and relax, and get ready to soak up some of the most memorable parts of the front-wheel-drive Escort story, and, of course, the best bits the modern fast Ford scene has to offer too.

Enjoy the mag!