HAL RIDGE

RX CORRESPONDENT

My memory of the year in unashamedly self-indulgent. Only two cars won a round of the World Rallycross Championship this year, and I got the incredible opportunity to drive one of them. The Peugeot 208 WRX used by rally legend Sebastien Loeb to win the Belgian round in May, as part of a feature for MN’S sister publication, Autosport.

Having squeezed myself into Loeb’s compact seating position, the 208 drove amazingly, with incredible response from the two-litre engine and suspension so efficient that you hardly noticed Lydden Hill’s kerbs and rough sections. That was followed by an outing in a rather more agricultural Will Gollop MG Metro 6R4, the car that Tiff Needell raced in the 1989 Rallycross Grand Prix, complete with its wailing naturally aspirated V6 engine.

Wherever top-flight rallycross technology goes in the coming years, the cars of the Group B era and today’s Supercar machines deserve their place in the history books.

Driving both on the same day is something that will stay with me for a very, very long time.