Winning Safari Rally Kenya was definitely one of the biggest moments of my career. It was also the toughest week of rallying I can remember.
There’s a lot of chatter about how tough this Safari is compared to that one or how much shorter rallies are generally these days. I can only talk about what I’ve done and what I have experience of and, trust me, that week was pretty full on.
The Safari is definitely one of the events I’d always wanted to compete on, let alone win. I missed it when I was working for M-Sport as a mechanic back in the day and I’d heard so many stories about the country and the roads. I was so chuffed when it came back to the calendar and Elfyn [Evans] and I would be doing it. And it’s always lived up to that reputation for toughness.
Every rally is about more than just the Thursday afternoon to Sunday where we compete against the clock. World championship events are, effectively, run over a week with two recce passes of every stage completed before we start the actual event.
The recce varies from event to event: sometimes it can be more straightforward if the route is very similar to the previous year. You don’t need to make too many changes to the notes. The Safari had lots of new stages, so I decided I would re-write everything.
Re-writing the pacenotes is a huge task for WRC co-drivers - especially when a lot of the event is new
Writing notes in a recce car isn’t always the easiest thing, especially on some of the bumpiest roads in Africa. That’s why we re-write all the notes into a fresh book. Doing that for something like, for example, the 20-mile Camp Moran stage takes about four and a half hours for the 60 pages.
It’s that aspect which lengthened the days in Kenya. You couldn’t get everything done at night, so we would be up early in the morning – a couple of nights it was like two and a half to three hours sleep.
A step forward in that direction for me was starting to wear glasses. I was finding that, by nine or 10 at night, my eyes were going and I had to switch off. Glasses have given me a new lease of life – I can keep working for another couple of hours now.
Getting the notes re-written is a really big aspect of the week, psychologically it’s a big hurdle to get over ahead of the rally. When you write that last note, you lean back, take a breath and smile – you’re fully ready for the rally to start.
The start of Safari is always in Nairobi, south of the service park in Naivasha. We’re fortunate in that we get to avoid the traffic on the road and take a helicopter ride down there. It was about 45 minutes, but it was nice just to sit there and do nothing but look out of the window at the amazing landscape.
I’m not sure anything has changed this year. Safari was our sixth podium on the bounce and a third win from six startsScott Martin
As you’ll have known from reading and watching on DirtFish, the Safari went pretty well for Elfyn and I. It was almost quite surreal by Saturday afternoon that we had this big lead of almost three minutes. On any other rally, you’d be fairly relaxed about the rest of the event with a lead like that, but with the Safari you couldn’t relax at all; it can be taken away from you in the blink of an eye.
The plan for Sunday was, of course, to bring the car home. We did have a bit of a think about possible powerstage points – we thought we’d just have a look and feel for the pace when we got there. But before that, there were difficult stages to come. We were quite concerned about how they could cut up, or I was. I think Elfyn might have been a bit more relaxed than me!
There’s no doubt, you need a bit of luck on your side to win the Safari. We’ve been fresh out of luck in Kenya in the past, but this time when we got a puncture, it was near the end of the stage and then we had the problem with the alternator belt on the final day. Again, we had time to fix this on the road section between stages.
For somebody like Elfyn, changing an [alternator] belt is no big deal. I’m not a bad mechanic, but he’s got more experience. In moments like that, we know what we’re doing and we just get on with it – it’s vital to stay calm and keep an eye on the watch.
When we came through the end of that stage and the Maasai were waiting for us, it was just amazing. There was plenty of cheering and drums being banged – I got out of the car and couldn’t resist banging the drums.
Instinct took over for Martin at the end of the final stage
The feeling at that moment? Happiness, of course, but the overwhelming feeling was just relief.
We’d won the Safari Rally. That’s a big deal. A very big deal. I’d like to say we celebrated all night, but actually we headed to the airport, had a couple of drinks with the team then got on an overnight flight back to London. I was asleep before we took off and woke up five hours later, still sitting bolt upright in my seat.
There’s no denying it’s been a great start to the season for Elfyn and I.
I’ve heard a few folk talking about us turning a page or trying to figure what’s changed for this year. I’m not sure anything has changed this year. Safari was our sixth podium on the bounce and a third win from six starts.
Go back a bit further, to the middle of last year and we were right in the thick of the fight for the title with Ott [Tänak] and Thierry [Neuville]. Then we had a driveshaft problem and a crash in Finland, came away from there with a big fat zero and the championship chance started to fade a bit.
You guys at DirtFish did the math on this one a while ago, showing Elfyn had scored more points than any other driver since the start of 2020. Obviously, we’re aware some of the drivers have been on part programs, but I think that’s a fair representation of where we’re at.
Everything feels good right now. Even in Sweden, there were no moments, nothing erratic, everything just felt under control. People are asking me if I’ve seen a change in Elfyn, but I honestly haven’t – he’s in a good groove right now and it’s working.
I think you know Elfyn’s a bit of a perfectionist, but in this sport you have to be a bit more adaptable and understanding of the fact that conditions change and you have to compromise. That’s where Elfyn is right now: he’s leaving room for those moments when the car’s not completely perfect or the there’s something with the tire or something like that.
It’s the same with the set-up, he’s retaining flexibility in the car that if the road surface changes dramatically between the first and second pass, he’s not gone too far in one direction that he can’t adapt the set-up.
Like I said, it’s just working right now. But there’s been no eureka moment, he’s doing what he does. We’re doing what we do.
That’s not to say there’s any complacency about winning an event like the Safari.
At the start of this column, I talked about the work we put in to make it happen. It’s that hard work that builds towards that Sunday afternoon celebration. Don’t get me wrong, I have the best job in the world and I wouldn’t change a thing, but it’s important for people to understand the effort that goes in to create these moments.
Martin doesn't feel there's been an eureka moment this year - things are just working
I’ve been in the sport for a while now and I remember when I took my first win and then a couple more. I thought: ‘This is brilliant! I can’t wait for more!’
And then a couple of months go by and they don’t come. That made me realize these opportunities don’t come around so often, a win in the world championship is hard to find.
That – and the fact that this was Toyota’s 100th WRC start since coming back in 2017 – made the Safari so special. And, of course, our deputy team principal Juha Kankkunen celebrating 40 years since his first win in Kenya.
Here’s one for you… I first met Juha on the 1998 Rally Australia, when he was driving the Valvoline Ford Escort WRC and I was working as a mechanic for M-Sport.
And there we were standing next to each other on the top step of the podium.
Like I said, a tough week, but a very, very special one.
