DAVID EVANS

“A lad who makes his dad proud...”

Teenage sons can be a nightmare. Rooms shouldn’t be tidied, greens shouldn’t eaten and wet tyres should be shared. Sunday morning demonstrated at least one those to be true in the Solberg household. And we’re not talking bedrooms or vegetables. Last week was the first time the Solbergs had visited West Sussex in 11 years. Oliver thinks he remembers that first time, but he’s not sure. He was six.

Petter was at Goodwood as part of his Farewell Tour. He was there for fun and to do a bit of gardening for the Duke of Richmond. But the focus was very much on having a good time and sharing that good time with Oliver.

Things started well as Petter reacquainted himself with the Subaru Impreza WRC 02 he used to score his maiden World Rally Championship win at Rally GB 17 years ago. He hadn’t driven it on the loose since Sunday November 17, 2002.

“So many memories came back when I was driving this car again,” he said. Clearly, not all of them…

“Actually, that’s true. I came on the startline for the first time and I was sitting there thinking: ‘How is the launch working?’ I couldn’t remember which buttons to press! But what a car, so nice to drive again. Nice power and balance – really fantastic car.”

Petter promised the competition element was secondary for him. And so it was. At least for a moment.

At least until Petter sent the Volkswagen Polo R Supercar up the hill for the first time. He was second fastest. When Volkswagen Motorsport engineer

Phil Barrett pointed the time out to his driver, he lit the blue touch paper.

“Seriously?” said Solberg. Seriously.

Everything then got that bit more serious. Donuts? Dancing on the Duke’s front lawn? Forget it. Petter was a man with a new mission. The talk turned to rollbars, tyre pressures and cranking the Polo up to the max.

When the rain came on Sunday morning, Petter commandeered his son’s boots (actually, there were plenty of wets to go around, but Petter liked the look of Oliver’s the most) and then went faster than Romain Dumas in Goodwood’s new benchmark-making ID R.

Could internal combustion eclipse the future?

Not once the rain eased and the track dried.

Petter was happy with second, but delighted with third place for his son – a result which came despite a Supercar set-up about as far removed from what the drying track demanded as possible.

There’s nothing new about a spectacular Solberg, but for the first time it was Oliver who stole the limelight. And nobody cheered longer or louder than Petter.

Oliver’s DS 3 was running the sort of soft gravel trim that delivered genuine Sunday afternoon theatre. A precise, apex-clipping run would have delivered nothing but understeer, especially on wets. Instead, Oliver pulled a big gear, wound up the boost and threw it from corner to corner in a sensational series of slides. Rarely (if ever) has anybody threaded the eye of the Molecomb needle with quite such a monstrous Scandinavian flick.

The crowd loved it. Oliver loved it. And Petter was pretty chuffed too. A chip off the old block, the boy done good.