“International win is on the bucket list”
I’ve been fortunate enough to win the Manx National Rally a record-equalling five times in my Ford Focus WRC05. Records are there to be broken so hopefully we can break it! We go there every year with the same attitude and same approach and we just try and do our best. The Isle of Man is a proper motorsport island, that’s what it’s famous for, so that makes it even more special to go there and win. To win the
Manx is like winning a championship itself.
I just love the atmosphere out there, the roads are second to none with the ones barely wide enough to fit the car to the fast double-width sections. We’ve got a lovely place we stay when we go, it’s like a proper home from home and all the boys from the moment they leave the garage they get up to Heysham for the ferry and get a Chinese takeaway, the whole process we’ve got, everyone enjoys it. It’s one we all want to go to every year.
I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve done the rally now but I’ve often done both the National and the International in the same year. The first time would’ve been 2007 in the Citroen C2 where we did the National as practice for the International which was part of our British
Rally Championship campaign.
But that International win has so far eluded me. We finished third overall in 2010 with a Subaru and were seventh overall in a historic Mk2 Escort in 2017. Because of that we were going to go out there in the Fiesta Super 2000 in 2018 but the rally was cancelled. I know it would’ve been hard to beat the British Rally Championship boys in the R5s as they’re not slouches but we were aiming for that. To win the International is obviously on the bucket list at some point.
I have great memories from the early days too, heading over on one of my first ever trips away with dad, the year David Mann won in the Group A Impreza. I studied for my GCSES on the ferry over and then spent the weekend following my Dad when he drove his Impreza S5 WRC in the management car.
And one of the best stages I’ve ever done in my whole career came three years later in 2006 in the Peugeot 106 Maxi – the same car Justin Dale took to third overall on the 2000 Manx International. We caught three cars in one stage before the differential blew up a mile from the end. That car was just built for there, it’s just such a shame we never got to finish the rally.
I love everything about the Isle of Man and I can’t wait to get back there as soon as we can.