A favourite rally stage...

Just for fun - might anyone here have videos to offer of their favourite rally stage?

Just prompted by South Australian friend Mike Bennett - of Lotus 12 fame and an occasional TNF contributor - there's this footage of my favourite...The Adelaide Classic's Paris Creek Road.

https://www.shannons...is-creek-stage/

We wanted to roll up this Stage, and bring it back home with us.  For anyone who likes fast open roads this was - and I understand from Mike still is - special.  It certainly used to clean the plugs, as they say...

DCN

One has to proffer some of the most obvious, simply because they are some of the very best.

• The Monte Carlo stage up and over the Col de Turini (it has various names, but runs from St Martin Vesubie to Piera Cava, or vice versa.
• Ouninpohja in Finland - the classic 1000 Lakes stage with all those jumps that Walter Rohrl so detested.
• The Motu forest in New Zealand - more than 40kms of twisting forest trail, where Colin McRae was peerless
• El Condor in Argentina - up, up, up and over the top.
• Dikkebus in the Ypres Rally
• The Panzerplatz in the Baumholder military ranges in Germany - 30 or 40 Kms of dirty tarmac, broken concrete and nasty road side tank-traps to catch the unwary

Oh, too many to list, but an honourable mention for one of my favourites, Grizedale in the Lake District (essence of British forest rallying) and for tarmac specialist, the Eppynt Ranges in S. Wales (narrow, super fast and jumps to make even the Finns blanch).

Dalby and  Wykeham are , or rather were . the quintessential North York Moors forest stages . Dalby in particular . It was up to 20 miles long and if you bothered to walk in for an hour , you'd get a mile of ultra fast track in a wilderness of pines , all to yourself . I also very much enjoyed the majestic setting of the   Hobcarton stage in the Whinlatter Pass .This being the Lake District, it would invariably sleet , rain or snow at some point , but the noise of a Metro 6 R4  echoing off the scree was unforgettable , 

Good job it is as , sadly , stage rallying in England has now been destroyed by hyper zealous officialdom and has become a parody of its former self , from a spectating perspective 

Passo di Gavia! Of course not used in rallies for ages, but it seems to have been sometimes included in Giro d'Italia cycling classic, so someone just might have a video. If it can be traversed on skinny tyred bikes, it must now be sealed surface throughout, which is a pity, but still the sheer fearfulness can be appreciated.

Oh, and preferably driven from north to south...

Edited by proviz, 12 October 2020 - 07:51.

In Tasmania (Australia) one of my favourites is the Styx Road, from Karanja to Maydena or vice versa. 45 kms of good gravel road through (what was once) native forest. Varying terrain with high speed and very low speed corners. Was a stage of the southern Tas ARC events for many years. 

I am fortunate to live in the Lake District and within a few miles of the north Lakes stages. Setmurthy is a regular dog walk along with Wythop and the two Whinlatter stages.  Over the years I've organised several rallies over those tests. It's a very long time since Dodd was used but when you walk down it you see why Barry Lee rolled for about 200 yards!  Sadly the north Lakes stages only get used once a year on the MWR and even them they have to be clear by 11.00.   I think part of the issue now is the amount of damage just one pass of those stages does compared to 30 or more years ago. 

Possibly my favourite to drive is Dalbeattie to the west of Dumfries, not too many junctions but sinuous and changes of gradient.   I drove the Turini and a few others of the MCR classics a couple of years ago.  Wonderful.

I do feel that access ot our forests is going to be more and more limited. For years there was a national limit of 64 allocations but even last year the total number was about a third of that.  The FC are now accountant and profit driven, there is more and more public access for walking and biking plus the pressures from the "greens". 

We have seen the best of forest rallying and I count myself very luck to have been involved. 

Passo di Gavia! Of course not used in rallies for ages, but it seems to have been sometimes included in Giro d'Italia cycling classic, so someone just might have a video. If it can be traversed on skinny tyred bikes, it must now be sealed surface throughout, which is a pity, but still the sheer fearfulness can be appreciated.

Oh, and preferably driven from north to south...

The Gavia is all tarmac - I drove over it quite a few years back now.  Nearly all the classic Alpine passes are tarmac these days.

I do feel that access ot our forests is going to be more and more limited. For years there was a national limit of 64 allocations but even last year the total number was about a third of that.  The FC are now accountant and profit driven, there is more and more public access for walking and biking plus the pressures from the "greens". 

 

We have seen the best of forest rallying and I count myself very luck to have been involved. 

You're probably right, although rallies brought in plenty of hard cash to the forestry mob.  The walkers  and bikers don't, so they will have a hole in their accounts.  Fortunately, we now have closed road rallying at last - pandemics permitting.

Edited by BRG, 12 October 2020 - 15:31.

I drove over the Gavia in 1986. Most of it was still gravel back then. In fact, starting from Bormio I actually lost faith after a few kilometers on reaching the end of the tarmac. No way could this ever narrowing road go on for such a distance still! I found a place to let a following car pass (Dutch plates if I'm not mistaken), turned around and drove back to Bormio. But having got there it seemed there simply was no other choice, it had to be have been the right way to go. So around we turned again for another try and guess what, after a few minutes there was this "Dutch" car on its way back down...

On reaching the top there were maybe half a dozen youngsters chilling on the porch of the cafe They'd arrived on enduro bikes and appeared a bit surprised to see us passing in a car. The southern side was... well, scary. You could see the road ahead for quite some distance, but in fact rather wished you couldn't. It seemed to be carved in the side of the mountain by the huge finger of a giant. Also the terrain underneath appeared so uncertain that it actually felt safer to carry on than to stop and be swept out by a landslide. So it became as a bit of relief when we drove into cloud.

Reaching the other end there was a barrier across the left side of the road. Driving slowly past I looked back and it said "Chiuso"! What!? It had definitely been "aperto" where we came from. Aha, so what they wanted to say was that it was only open from Bormio to the top, but a not on the other side down towards Ponte di Legno!

Glad they didn't tell us at the top.... 

I'd clean forgotten  that in "No Excuses" Sheila Van Damm waxed lyrical about how challenging (is that the right word?) the Gavia was during the 1950s Alpine. 
I found the tarmacked and walled Stelvio was impressive enough from the back seat of Dad's car in 1963.

Edited by D-Type, 12 October 2020 - 17:20.

The walkers and cyclists are handy scapegoats, but (having lived 2 minutes walk away from a  forest stage ) I've never encountered any issue with either, first hand . As for the usual 'greens' I'd count myself in their number but care for the environment just makes another convenient bogey man  . And a National Park naturalist friend was at pains to tell me how much good both cars and bikes did for invertebrate life on well cut forest tracks , . 

Local opposition is however perfectly understandable - crazy driving , awful parking , casual vandalism and loud swearing from some rally spectators hardly helps - and  I've collected bin liners of litter after their visit . 

But what has screwed it for me is the fact that over zealous organisers now kettle spectators like rioting protesters behind miles of red tape (literal and metaphorical ) and the freedom to explore a stage on foot has been lost for good. 

Marshalling of rally spectators has long been difficult, challenging and in my very restricted experience often wrong-headed.  On the Hawley stage of the RAC Rally one year in the early '70s (I think) a car hit a deep puddle, broke its steering and upon landing charged off-course into a knot of bystanders - leaving two or three with fractures.  Once they had been carted away (in an ambulance whose front-seat medic passenger had almost been thrown through the windscreen when the vehicle hit the same puddle at speed), rattled marshals then directed all spectators to stand on the exit side of the flooded hazard, in the impact zone, right beside the potential landing area, instead of back before the hazard.  Unbelievable.

I've always been a considerable fan of volunteer marshals, of course, but there have been - and there still are - exceptions...

DCN

1968. First stage. One spectator with a broken leg  was the wife of one of the service crew for one of our club team cars. I was a very young, very junior member of the service crew for another of our 3 car team.

Hawley was certainly not my favourite stage. Had 3 punctures on it when doing a local event as shakedown for the RAC 14 years later.   

I really can't think of a favourite complete stage. Bits of Hafren or Dyfi, I guess. Has to be central Wales. Some interesting choices above.

Grizedale - Another least favourite. 2 front punctures 8 and 11 miles into the 20 miler that was the first forest stage of the RAC that year. Changed them both and team mate who had one and tried to drive out on it went off and lost far more time than us. Punctured there  again on another RAC. It was kinda known for them. Kullang lost the RAC with 3 punctures on it the year Toivonen first won.

Ouninpohja - Done it as co-driver. Most 1000 Lakes stages too fast and down to who practiced most and (illegally) practiced fastest.

Dikkebus - Can't recall anything special about it. Often first stage on Ypres. One fast staggered Xroads. Kemelberg only Ypres stage I recall as being rather different.

Wythop and Whinlatter - very nice one RAC when they were the only two stages with snow (caught the car ahead, hardly a regular achievement for me at that level...)  

One new thought - Col d'Allos. Only ever drove it on holiday in road car but impressed by impossibly blind brow and not being able to see over the bonnet of a std RS2. (Goodness knows what it was like in a Big Healey). On the descent, the weight of wine bottles in the boot caused a moment at what Simo Lampinen called the "white shed". Even Romain Bardet (the best descender on a bike) had a serious wobble there on the Tour (or the Dauphine) a few years ago. 

The Gavia is all tarmac - I drove over it quite a few years back now.  Nearly all the classic Alpine passes are tarmac these days.

 

You're probably right, although rallies brought in plenty of hard cash to the forestry mob.  The walkers  and bikers don't, so they will have a hole in their accounts.  Fortunately, we now have closed road rallying at last - pandemics permitting.

I am not sure of that. These days the WRC and R5 cars do a huge amount of damage to the roads which need major repairs. and at the same time we don't attract the huge crowds of spectators who paid to park etc.  The cost of hiring a forest track has risen massively over the years while entries generally have dropped so costing event means basing it on fewer entries so thus higher entry fees which can mean fewer able to enter.  The FC is run by accountants these days.  Also walkers and bikers do pay to park, the bike shoopes and cafes pay very high rentals and are there all year. 

The walkers and cyclists are handy scapegoats, but (having lived 2 minutes walk away from a  forest stage ) I've never encountered any issue with either, first hand . As for the usual 'greens' I'd count myself in their number but care for the environment just makes another convenient bogey man  . And a National Park naturalist friend was at pains to tell me how much good both cars and bikes did for invertebrate life on well cut forest tracks , . 

 

Local opposition is however perfectly understandable - crazy driving , awful parking , casual vandalism and loud swearing from some rally spectators hardly helps - and  I've collected bin liners of litter after their visit . 

 

But what has screwed it for me is the fact that over zealous organisers now kettle spectators like rioting protesters behind miles of red tape (literal and metaphorical ) and the freedom to explore a stage on foot has been lost for good. 

Sadly it's MSUK and the FC that make the rules about kettle up the spectators. With some justification as there have been a few fatalities with spectators as we know. 

Perhaps, but  I researched the  rules in detail after being kettled myself . They were actually far less prescriptive than I'd imagined, and focussed on risk management, rather than total avoidance . I don't know what , exactly, the Forestry Commission say but they still seemed  relaxed with motor bike trials on my patch . The deaths were , I think , all on tarmac rallies with nowhere to hide and big speeds.  

.    

Just prompted by South Australian friend Mike Bennett - of Lotus 12 fame and an occasional TNF contributor - there's this footage of my favourite...The Adelaide Classic's Paris Creek Road.

 

https://www.shannons...is-creek-stage/

Have we just witnessed a relaxation of Doug's disdain for tin-tops? Maybe they are all right on tarmac rallies 

I've always been a considerable fan of volunteer marshals, of course, but there have been - and there still are - exceptions...

 

DCN

Quite so. 

But they do sometimes have to deal with some ******** spectators.  I was marshalling on the Tour of Dean years back at a point where the stage looped back on itself, separated by a closed wooden gate.  We were marshalling both corners apparently! The usual family group appeared, complete with baby in pushchair and women in high heels, and stood in the full line of fire with the gate blocking their escape.  I had a long argument with them before I persuaded them to move.  As I stood there watching them walking off to a safe point, a car lost it and nearly wiped me out.  Fortunately, I wasn't wearing high heels on that occasion and leapt out of the way OK.  All the spectators took notice of my advice after that!

Perhaps, but  I researched the  rules in detail after being kettled myself . They were actually far less prescriptive than I'd imagined, and focussed on risk management, rather than total avoidance . I don't know what , exactly, the Forestry Commission say but they still seemed  relaxed with motor bike trials on my patch . The deaths were , I think , all on tarmac rallies with nowhere to hide and big speeds.  

.    

Not quite, sadly there have been two deaths on rallies I was involved with and more recently there were spectator casualties on the Snowman Rally.  Sadly these days, whilst there are fewer spectators they are less inclined to observe marshals or even apply common sense.. 

  All the spectators took notice of my advice after that!

You were lucky. in the early 1980s we were marshalling an RAC Rally stage in Knebworth with a slightly downhill approach to a left/right over a bridge. Straight-on at the left was grass which we tried to keep clear in case of an overshoot. Happily we had just cleared it for the nth time when a competitor used the overshoot leaving a set of deep ruts in the grass. Even with the evidence of those ruts it was hard work keeping the spectators back.

Much easier was a Welsh forest stage which was a non-spectator ("secret") stage starting around midnight. At about 11:30 a couple of hundred locals appeared out of the darkness on foot and set off into the forest - since they had not been told they could spectate we had no responsibility for their safety!

Edited by Allan Lupton, 13 October 2020 - 12:27.

Any stage on Mull gets my vote. I also would love to have a go at the Tak-ma-doon road if we ever get closed road events locally. In the forests it has to be Carron and Drummond hill. Done them all but would love to have another go in something really quick.

Any stage on Mull gets my vote. I also would love to have a go at the Tak-ma-doon road if we ever get closed road events locally. In the forests it has to be Carron and Drummond hill. Done them all but would love to have another go in something really quick.

You've got closed road events if someone organises them.  Get your local motor clubs working on it.

My old motor club, with others, was putting on a closed road rally just east of Stevenage this year.  It was all agreed, authorised, PR'd successfully and ready to go, in an area where I would have been sure that such a event would never ever be tolerated.  Then came the dreaded you-know-what and that was that.  Until next year, we hope!

Have we just witnessed a relaxation of Doug's disdain for tin-tops? Maybe they are all right on tarmac rallies 

Tin tops as in production saloon cars...well, they are for other enthusiasts to love.  They leave me stone cold.  Tin tops as in two-seat GT cars...luvvly jubbly.

DCN

Tin tops as in production saloon cars...well, they are for other enthusiasts to love.  They leave me stone cold.  Tin tops as in two-seat GT cars...luvvly jubbly.

 

DCN

Where would you class the early 70's ETCC Mk1 Ford Capri and BMW 3.2 / 3.5 CSL, Doug?  Both (just about) four seaters as production road cars, but I would see them as nothing else but a sports car / GT car in race trim - albeit still production based.

I've scanned through this thread with interest because it's something that I can't quite answer if we're talking real life stages. So much of my interest in circuit racing is from the fact that since the age of about 10 I've been able to play racing games and sims and appreciate the circuits from that perspective. If asked what my favourite circuits are they're always through the filter of someone who has "driven" them a lot, in various cars.

Rally games haven't tended to have as many real stages because they're often long and require a lot of extra work to build. They often contain fictitious stages. As a result, I can't even fathom how to rate a rally stage without having experienced driving it in a virtual world.

So I guess the answer is Bluff Knoll.

Where would you class the early 70's ETCC Mk1 Ford Capri and BMW 3.2 / 3.5 CSL, Doug?  Both (just about) four seaters as production road cars, but I would see them as nothing else but a sports car / GT car in race trim - albeit still production based.

Production-based.  Indeed - to me that's a block...  Sorry, but those things would leave me almost completely unmoved, looking elsewhere around the paddock (or Parc Ferme) for something of interest (to me)...   Wouldn't it be dull if everybody loved Marmite?  

DCN

Favourite stage? Well I can remember bits of stages but which stage they actually were...   except I can remember being scared silly downhill in Ceri or on ice in Penmachno, does that count? 

I have got a nice little stretch of road here in Devon tucked away in the back of my mind should the proposed closed road event survive Covid.

Pretty much all of Devon would be great for a closed road rally.  We could put the British round of the WRC there.   The 'Clotted Cream on top of the Jam' Rally GB.

Production-based.  Indeed - to me that's a block...  Sorry, but those things would leave me almost completely unmoved, looking elsewhere around the paddock (or Parc Ferme) for something of interest (to me)...   Wouldn't it be dull if everybody loved Marmite?  

 

DCN

Absolutely, Doug - the 500cc era F3 cars do nothing at all for me, for example.  It's the only kind of car I would walk away from spectating at an historic meet.  There'll be plenty of devotees for them though, like anything!

Apologies for the thread drift, normal service to be resumed...

Some stages make an impact that is nothing to do with their quality in rallying.

As we approach 11 November it is appropriate to recall a stage on the Tour of Flanders (not, as might be expected, the 24 Hours of Ypres).

First time making notes for this stage, as we left the finish and entered  a village we passed a standardised road sign announcing its name - in Flemish, as Passendale.

Better known in its French spelling as Passchendaele.

Making the hairs on the back of your neck stand up is a greatly misused term....but not in this case. 

If you go to that area, you will find reminders on almost every road.  Cemeteries, shrines, memorials.  To their credit, the Belgians have never forgotten.  To this day, the traffic is stopped and the Last Post is sounded at 5pm every afternoon at the Menin Gate in Ieper.

Others have forgotten, or never knew.  On the recent Gent-Wevelgem cycle race, there was a helicopter shot of Talbot House in Poperinge which was duly captioned as such.  The Eurosport commentator said something like 'There's Talbot House then, whatever that is!'  I guess Toc H is unknown history for generations who are taught that history began with Adolf Hitler.

I'd opt for the Turini as a stand out stage for me.   I've been there once, watching the 1972 Monte from the top.....that was courtesy of CCC magazine & Osram-GEC who had a competition in that mag, the prize being an all expenses paid trip to watch the 1972 Monte. Yours truly was the winner, my younger brother went with me along with an Osram-GEC Manager. as chaperone...I don't think they expected a schoolboy winning the competition, we had to take time off school

Plus, the Turini was where Dad had a big off on the 1964 event, when a tyre  blowout sent their [Bobby Parkes / Arthur Senior] works Reliant Sabre off the edge and back down onto the road they'd been on a few seconds earlier...a bit like Tanak's accident on this year's Monte, 

Edited by Dick Dastardly, 16 October 2020 - 13:56.

The whole of the much missed RAC Rally 60s 70s 80s especially . William Woollard and twice nightly BBC 2 Rally reports , The BT  latest results line . Motoring News. 300 plus entrants  in with a chance, Proper difficult  mud and snow surfaces. 2 wheel drive .  Motoring News events with the whole back page coverage. A fantastic variety of cars  sports and saloons  in different shapes sizes, capacities. Live stage TV coverage The properly impecunious competitor  with no back up at all.  The wonderful adventure rallies over 3 weeks the London Sydney in '68 and London Mexico in '70.

In short I miss winter rallying  when it was at its brilliant best  and especially the  real RAC in late November in bad weather and difficult terrain. with a huge entry and massive public interest and TV  & print coverage ..............while you were sitting by a log fire !

You've got closed road events if someone organises them.  Get your local motor clubs working on it.

 

My old motor club, with others, was putting on a closed road rally just east of Stevenage this year.  It was all agreed, authorised, PR'd successfully and ready to go, in an area where I would have been sure that such a event would never ever be tolerated.  Then came the dreaded you-know-what and that was that.  Until next year, we hope!

Indeed I was certain to be there this passed summer had it gone ahead with the Herts County Auto and Aero club - which we believe is the oldest motor club in Britain having been started in the 19th century   and the Aero bit  pre dates aircraft  and refers to balloonists . Having started mainly with speed hillclimb events before they were banned on public roads . So one of the first events on closed public roads would have been something of a milestone had it happened this year  .

Well I only did a couple of years of rallying here in Australia. One favourite was called 'Poo Farm Road' and ran around the sewage treatment works outside Canberra. A ton of fun - 8km of second-gear lefts and rights. Perfect for the low-powered Holden Gemini I was using. In some parts the corners were so perfectly spaced you could slide out of a corner - hold the slide all the way to the turn-in point for the next. That turn was achieved with a lift of the throttle and the slide would start the other way. Just brilliant!

But that stage is gone, now, as are so many others.

Of the stages still in use, I rather enjoyed The River Road, outside Nelligen in the New South Wales South Coast hinterland. As the name suggests, it follows a river, in this case the Clyde. The road twists and turns, even has some elevation changes. A mix of open fast corners and dead-stop hairpins, you're turning it seems every 50 metres.

Bruce Moxon

Here's a map:


https://www.google.c....1313345,15.25z

...   On the recent Gent-Wevelgem cycle race, there was a helicopter shot of Talbot House in Poperinge which was duly captioned as such.  The Eurosport commentator said something like 'There's Talbot House then, whatever that is!'  I guess Toc H is unknown history for generations who are taught that history began with Adolf Hitler.

Well, that might just be Eurosport for you -- if ITV4 had been covering it, I suspect that either the erudite and well-read David Millar would have known, or Ned Boulting would have researched it beforehand...

Edited by 2F-001, 18 October 2020 - 11:18.

Boulting and Millar have proved the impossible - to be better than the famed Liggett/Sherwen team. That's also coming from zero cycling knowledge in Boulting's case. His book "The Yellow Jumper" is quite amusing.

It's clear from the adverts (animal charities and funeral plans) during live Tour coverage that ITV4 recognises that probably more than half the viewers are senior citizens and are as interested in the scenery as much as the race. Nothing wrong with that under the Imlach/Boulting/Millar era but Liggett/Sherwen had begun to take the p*ss over anything not directly concerning the race eg. "That's the Chateau de ***** Phill" "Yes Paul, I thought that must be the Chateau de *****"."

It's where rallying went wrong of course. TV coverage of short repeated stages and not covering the wider picture/route/countryside, but we all know why it changed and can't go back.

I empathise greatly with mention of the cycle racing on TV - having spent the last two hours glued to combined coverage of the Giro d'Italia in and near the Friulian Dolomites and the Tour of Flanders in, well you know where...  Fabulously watchable coverage of both - and it's largely the geography that entrances, while the athletic capability (and downhill daring) of those guys is to me barely believable...

DCN. 

I really got interested in bike racing from watching the TdF on ITV and seeing places in the Alps that I knew from ski holidays.  That is turn lead me to make summer visits to the Alps to explore the high passes.  And that is why there is all that scenery and local history and so on - not just to fill in the quieter moments but to encourage tourism. ( You remember tourism, we used to have it before the virus).  It was why God's own county (or so they say) of Yorkshire paid for the Tour de France to start there and since then have supported the Tour de Yorkshire (sic) to encourage visitors and to some effect.  

I also enjoy seeing the bike riders tackling some of our motor sporting venues.  To return to the thread topic, the recent Gent-Wevelgem bike race (see #31) seeing the peloton tackling the Monteberg near Dranouter in Belgium brought back memories of using the same road on the Monteberg Rallysprint.  The recent cycling World Championships started and finished on the Imola circuit and intrepid Belgian bike racers even sometimes stray onto the hallowed tarmac of Spa-Francorchamps.

A fantastic variety of cars  sports and saloons  in different shapes sizes, capacities. Live stage TV coverage The properly impecunious competitor  with no back up at all. 

Mechanics wandering around the spectator car park adjacent to servicing points looking for a parts donor vehicle... We promise that we'll sort you out...