Colin McRae Tribute
by John Fife (21 September 2007)
The world of sport has lost a champion, rallying has lost a true hero and the Scots have lost a genuine personality following the tragedy which robbed us of the lives of Colin McRae, his son Johnny, Johnny's school friend Ben Porcelli, and family friend Graeme Duncan. It was a shock which has left world rally fans reeling in disbelief and Scottish fans bereft.
Colin McRae was not just a successful rally driver, he was a supremely gifted, but modest individual who was thrust into the limelight. The driving was always something he could cope with, but it was the media pressure which took time for him to come to terms with. Over recent years, he was more able to deal with the high profile demands that his position required, but he never lost his common touch, a fact which endeared him to all who knew him.
After a successful career on two wheels as a junior motocross and motorcycle trials champion, Colin turned his attention to four wheels as soon as he turned 16. With his father Jim heavily involved in rallying, Colin needed a little bit of help to compete in autotest events with his self-built Mini, and so began a long association with Coltness Car Club where a number of club members took it in turns to take him to and from events.
His 17th birthday and a full licence couldn't come soon enough for the talented youngster. In a borrowed Hillman Avenger he was challenging for the lead of his first ever rally event at Kames at the tail end of 1985 before the inevitable happened. He hit a rock and the Avenger rolled - ever so slightly! He still finished, but a lowly 14th. If he thought he had cracked this rallying lark, his next outing on the Galloway Hills proved there was a lot more to learn, and he recorded his first ever non-finish.
A full season in the Esso Scottish Rally Championship followed in 1986 where his first regular co-driver, Nicky Jack, realised very early on, the lad was something special. His best result that year was 9th overall on the Autofit Stages in Argyll. Quite something in a 1600cc Talbot Sunbeam amongst all those hills.
He rounded off the year with 18th place on the Kingdom Stages and finished 18th overall in the Esso national series at his first attempt. He also finished third in the Newcomers category and was awarded the Jaggy Bunnet Flying Brick as the season's hardest trier. It was an award he later displayed proudly amongst an increasingly impressive and huge collection of gold, silver and crystal.
The following year he switched to a Vauxhall Nova with Derek Ringer, but not before he contested his first ever international event, the Swedish Rally in February, where Ian Grindrod was a last-minute stand-in co-driver.
According to Ian he was pressurised into the seat by Jim (McRae) because, as he claimed at the time, he was already too old to be sitting beside some ambitious, hard-driving youngster. Unfortunately Ian broke a rib in a road accident during the recce and an apprehensive Mike Broad was shipped across the water at the last minute. Fortunately, Mike quickly realised he was sitting beside a precocious, unfearing, but still decidedly raw talent.
In 1988, driving a whole range of cars in the Scottish, Marlboro National and British Rally Championships, he won his first major title, the Esso Scottish Rally Championship. During that year he had driven the Nova, a Peugeot 205, a Peugeot 309, a Nissan 240RS and a Ford Sierra Cosworth. He also recorded his first outright wins on the Tweedies Daihatsu in Dumfries, the Border in the Tweed Valley and the Hackle Rally in Perth.
But it was in 1989 that the world of rallying got its first real glimpse of what was to come. He finished 5th overall on New Zealand's world championship counter. And the rest, as they say, is history.
He won the British title in 1991 and 1992 and became the first Brit (since Roger Clark in 1976) to win a round of the World Championship when he won the Rally of New Zealand in a Subaru Legacy in 1993. The world title followed after a nail-biting finish in 1995 against team-mate Carlos Sainz, when the title was decided by the narrowest of margins on the final round, the RAC Rally.
So much for his record, but it was the manner of the man and his driving which ultimately led to an almost cult following amongst rally fans around the world, and then he conquered America.
At the X-Games extreme event showcase last year, there were still people who thought Colin was simply a character in a Video Game. When he rolled the Subaru Impreza on the final bend of his final run, but still crossed the finish line, the 80,000 crowd erupted. They thought he had done it deliberately. Yet another legend was born.
Away from the rallying scene, Colin was a devoted father to Johnny and Hollie, and occasionally took his wife Alison along on club events as co-driver. He was also a stalwart member of Coltness Car Club. Indeed when the club took over a vacant Forestry Commission allocation 14 years ago, he financially supported that inaugural event and thereafter was persuaded annually to sponsor the event which bears his name to this day.
It was Colin's way of putting something back into the club and the sport. What is less well known is the number of younger drivers that Colin spent time with individually over the years and more recently on a formal basis with the Albar Junior Scholarship in the County Saab Scottish Championship.
He loved anything with an engine, even jetskis. He and Barrie Lochhead installed a Ford Escort Cosworth RS engine and drivetrain into a Ford Transit van, just so he could get to the water quicker! That passion extended from quads and Rage buggies to race bikes and race cars and ultimately to helicopters.
It was a passion matched with talent. He was competitive in everything he drove from a British Touring Car Championship BMW to a Jordan F1 car, from a Nissan pickup on the Paris-Dakar to Ferrari drives at Le Mans, and even a works MotoGP Suzuki. Outwardly, his was an attacking, exciting, flamboyant driving style, but inwardly, to those who sat beside him, they saw only controlled and fluid aggression. Personally speaking, I likened him to Jim Clark - faster than any mechanical device he was given.
As a helicopter pilot, I too can vouch for his professional approach and deft touch on the controls. Shortly after he got the Squirrel, he gave Jim Brown (President, Coltness Car Club) and myself a lift up to Perth. I found it very hard that day to reconcile the image of the professional pilot with my first recollections of a hell-for-leather motorcyclist.
At this time I can't comprehend how the families are coping with this tragedy but my thoughts go out to the McRae family and friends, the other families involved, and especially Alison and Hollie.
