Smashed windscreens, crashed cars, missing panels and ill-fitting wheels - ah, for a rally that did not start with drama!

The Behind The Drive team and Evo are awaiting the start of the Targa Wrest Point rally, or Targa Lite, is the warm-up for the Big One, Targa Tasmania. It uses the southern Hobart roads that used to be a part of the main event before th course changed several years ago, and they were so missed that Targa WP was created four years ago to bring them back into play and sate the locals and the drivers who missed them so.

But this rally, at which this writer and co-driver Claire have competed three of its four years, has always been a dramatic one.

The long haul from Sydney to the docks of Melbourne itself takes a day, then there is the overnight boat ride across the bass Strait to the top of Tasmania, before a final three-hour leg to the little island’s base in Hobart. It was in the latter, closing stages of the journey that the dramas began.

Our teammates have just purchased a beautiful Evo 9 rally car, and on the liaison down to Hobart, the windscreen was cracked. Swapping the Behind The Drive Evo 6 off the trailer and the Evo 9 onto it, we continued on our way, only to find two miles down the road that a fellow competitor had run out of fuel. Stopping to give them our only jerry can, we managed only 10 more miles before coming across a massive head-on accident involving members of the public only, though many competitors had stopped to render assistance by using their oil spill kits to mop up the escaping car fluids and clamping off fuel lines.

By the time we finally got to Hobart airport to collect codriver Claire, we were two hours behind schedule and missing a part of the car, the rear wheel flare, which had been lost somewhere along the way (another ‘fix it in Hobart’ part we had forgotten about before unloading and driving the car).

And on arrival, we discovered the brand new rims we had bought recently did not fit the car. While we had checked the clearance on the rear wheel for clearance under the flares, we had not thought to check the brake clearance at the front wheels. And nothing could be done or fixed, as it was Australia Day - one of our largest public holidays.

Sigh!

But with the crew flying in last night (Friday), tyres were swapped back to old rims, new windscreens were fitted, and the car is ready to go as I write this the morning of the rally.

It would not matter if we had six hours, six days or six months to prepare - it is always a last-minute rush, ensuring the adrenalin is rushing well before a key is even turned. And that’s why we love it. Or, at least that’s what we tell ourselves…

The history of the iconic Gran Turismo Injection Golf, or GTI, is a long and prestigious one. Rising from humble beginnings, the first 1976 GTI stood in a world ruled by V8 performance as an affordable yet practical alternative.

But though it is credited with kickstarting the hot hatch genre, the Golf soon lost its crown to the Japanese brands. The third and fourth generations grew heavy and dull, floundering in much stronger company.

But the 2004 Mk V abolished the sins of the past. Neither the fastest nor most powerful in its class, the GTI’s brilliance as a hard-working weekday drive and exciting weekend performer brought thousands of new and old followers to its badge. Over 1.7 million GTIs have been sold in its 33-year history.

Given this peppered past, GTI fans had reason to be nervous about the sixth generation - they need not have worried.

Read the rest of this entry »

Robby Gordon has fired back at allegations that his hummer had an illegal modification, and called the rival Minis of Stephane Peterhansel and Nani Roma “girl’s cars” in a rant captured by the official Dakar Rally coverage.

Gordon is currently still competing pending an appeal regarding the tire inflation system on his Hummer.

After coming into the finish line first on Friday’s stage, a full 20 minutes quicker than X-raid Minis, Gordon let fly.

“Kiss my ass! I just proved that Minis are for girls, because we beat them by 20 minutes,” Gordon declared.

“Last night I went through a whole thing and went to YouTube,” he said. “You can go to Robby Gordon, Dakar, Air inflation. Check it out, it’s posted and explains the whole system (it has since been taken down).

“It’s the same system that the French officials approved one year ago, and now they’ve changed their minds.”

Currently in fourth overall and too far behind to have a realistic chance of catching leader Peterhansel, Gordon said he now wants to prove a point.

“We schooled these boys,” he said. “I’m pissed. I’m pissed at Stephane and I’m pissed at Nani for challenging my character, about being a cheater.

“That, right there, is completely plugged (pointing to the apparently offending part) and I kicked their asses. I’m going to prove something every day for the rest of the rally. We’re going to win every special from here home.”

Hopefully the appeal will be sorted before the final finish line on Sunday.

Check out the YOUTUBE video here.

Polish ex-Lotus/Renault driver Robert Kubica has possibly reopened a fracture that he sustained in his rally accident last year in a fall at his home overnight.

Kubica slipped on a patch of ice in Pietrasanta, where he lives, and was taken to hospital complaining of pain in his right leg which was broken in his crash. Apparently, it is the old fracture to his tibia.

Kubica’s main injury from the pre-F1 season crash was to his arm, which was nearly severed when he hit a guard rail at speed and it impaled the car at the front, emerging though the boot.

With Kimi Raikkonen signed to his old seat, Kubica has been in talks with Ferrari about his possible comeback in 2013. Today, Ferrari boss Stefano Domenicali played down talk about a possible test later in the year.

“That was not on our plan,” said Domenicali.

“For sure, Robert Kubica is a great driver that had a very severe injuries and at the moment he is still working very hard to try to go back to his normal living.

“So before any kind of thinking or discussion of whatever could be, we need to wait and see. For sure that kind of injury is taking a long time to recover so I can say we will wait and see if he is going to recover, but at the moment there is nothing in place.”

And it’s about time, too.

For too long, Acura/Honda has been without a genuine sports car, focusing on smaller hatches, family sedans and green technology. But jut like Toyota, the company has realized that everybody needs a hero, and the NSX nameplate was thrown around once again.

This is not to say that the NSX will be a gas-guzzling sports car. In fact, the last NSX concept car, which featured a front-mounted V10 and design lines similar to Mazda’s Le Mans concept prototype, was a bit of a fail.

Returning to its mid-engined V6 roots and with an AWD setup, the NSX will still have horsepower help - with an electric push. In a revised version of its reasonably proficient but stupdly named SH-AWD setup, on-wheel electric motors will help spin up the fronts in an aped torque transfer setup, offering more grip, while another motor mounted in/as the center diff will push power to the rear. No news yet on exactly how much power it will develop…

The best news, however, came from president and CEO of Honda, Takanobu Ito, when he announced at the reveal in Detroit that the NSX will be competed as an official factory team, possibly on debut in the next two to three years.

The Dakar rally kicked off rather quietly at the turn of 2012, and not a stage had been completed when the infamous desert trek had tragically claimed its first victim.

Argentinian motorbike rider Jorge Martinez Boero fell from his Beta bike near the end of the 57km first stage on his home soil, and died later from his injuries.

Organisers said Boero “was the victim of a fall at kilometre 55 of the special of the first stage between Mar del Plata and Santa Rosa.”

“The rider suffered a cardiac arrest following his fall and was attended five minutes after the accident by the medical staff, who reached the place of the incident by helicopter.

“Despite their best efforts, the doctors were unable to resuscitate the pilot, who died while he was being taken to hospital.”

Boero was the son of a former Argentinian racing champion of the same name. It was the 38-year-old’s second Dakar rally. He had crashed into a ravine during stage six in Chile and had to wait eight hours before being rescued.

Boero’s death was the 21st of a competitor in the Dakar’s 29-year history, and a total of 59 people including spectators have died during the rally. It doesn’t bode well in today’s heavy OH&S society, which is a shame.

We have all seen that red GT3 rally Porsche taking on the streets of the UK and Germany. But it isn’t the only one out there, and an enthusiastic fan has compiled a montage of several crazy Stuttgart-armed rally teams taking on both tarmac and dirt… Enjoy.

After a long, drawn-out battle to stay afloat, Saab has finally sunk.

It seemed that Swedish carmaker Saab had been given yet another lifeline three months ago, when it made the serious but salvageable decision to go under administration and take creditor protection while it re-organised its business and looked for a sale in China.

Obviously, the administrator was overwhelmed, and the only way to salvage anything from the shipwreck is to file for bankruptcy. The finger is being pointed at parent company GM, who has placed too many conditions on Saab’s sale to interested Chinese concern Zhejiang Youngman Lotus.

SAAB Automobile Aktiebolag, Saab Automobile Tools AB, and Saab Automobile Powertrain have been filed, and it’s workers - who haven’t wrapped a chassis in metal since April this year, are facing a crappy Christmas. Apparently, those 4000 workers have not been paid for a month.

Off the back of the news that Petter Solberg will be joining #1 driver Jari-Matti Latvala at Ford next year, an avid fan has taped a recent test day with the Finn on the tarmac near Monte Carlo. And he;’s certainly pushing the new car to its limit. Click the image above for Latvala, or HERE for Solberg - and enjoy!