The Ultimate Era in Motorsport - GROUP B Rallying

The Ultimate Era in Motorsport - GROUP B

Once upon a time, some years back, there were a small number of cars built by Experts that were quick........ Very Quick. These cars were built by 6 Manufacturers, and were the fastest Motor Cars on earth. And they were run in the forest. They were quicker than the fastest of the Formula 1 cars of the day, as proved when a Peugeot 205 T16 raced a McLaren around the Nurburgring, and won. Four Wheel Drive can be such an advantage. To be in their presence was simply breathtaking, and all that witnessed them in action never ever forgot the experience.

At the peak of GROUP B excitement, 1-2 million people would attend a Rally, which completely swamped the towns and villages along the route of the Event. Many more watched television in amazement.

Sadly a number of people died in 1985 following a driver straying into the crowd, and this along with death of Henri Toivenen the following year, saw the end of Group B by the last round of the WRC in 1986. We were fortunate enough to be there at the last ever GROUP B Rally, held in Britain during December, 1986.

The cars themselves had extremely lightweight tubular Space Frame chassis's, which had very light fibreglass and Kevlar panels attached. The engines were mostyl Turbocharged, with some also Supercharged as well. The power delivery was initially of the order of 400-500 HP, although this later rose to over 700 HP in the Audi Quattro A2. Since most of the cars weighed between 600 and 720 kgs, these cars were quite literally mindblowing, with acceleration from 0-100 kph of under 2 seconds for the final Evolution versions.

It would be very difficult to describe the GROUP B experience in actual words, since it was a feeling that made every hair on one's body stand upright, and one's heart beat at a rate that it was'nt used to. One simply FELT these cars coming towards you, with every part of one's anatomy held in disbelief that something so radical existed............

Fortunately several of these amazing cars still exist.