McKlein’s retrospective of the 2001 World Rally Championship has taken a rather damp turn this week with action from a very wet first gravel rally of the year.
Rally Portugal 2001 will go down in history as having the worst weather in living memory. The conditions were bad enough to help eliminate two-thirds of the starters.
At the top of the leader-board the rally was a thriller, ending in a final stage shootout where Tommi Mäkinen edged out Carlos Sainz by a mere 8.6 seconds. This was round three of the 2001 season, where Richard Burns finally opened his points tally with fourth place, whilst his main rival, Colin McRae, came away with another no score, making it a hat trick of retirements for 2001.
For the photographers it was a proper challenge, especially those traditionalists working on ISO 200 transparency film. But perseverance paid off and some of the images were quite stunning.
Quite simply it’s an event we will never forget.
01. François Delecour & Daniel Grataloup, Ford Focus RS WRC. Fafe jump like you’ve not seen before – because you couldn’t!
02. Richard Burns & Robert Reid, Subaru Impreza WRC 2001. You could be forgiven for mistakenly thinking this was shot in Wales.
03. Alister McRae & David Senior, Hyundai Accent WRC2. Throwback to former times when photographers could put remote cameras in WRC cars during shakedown.
04. Tommi Mäkinen & Risto Mannisenmäki, Mitsubishi Lancer Evo 6.5. The cleanest action pic we have of the winning car.
05. Marcus Grönholm & Timo Rautiainen, Peugeot 206 WRC. There is no doubting the passion of Portuguese rally fans, however their behaviour in 2001 would contribute towards the rally being dropped from the WRC calendar for a few years.
06. Carlos Sainz & Luis Moya, Ford Focus RS WRC. The notorious stage around Arganil becomes a different beast in the fog and rain.
07. Alister McRae & David Senior, Hyundai Accent WRC2. Sixth place was a decent result for the younger McRae brother.
08. Carlos Sainz & Luis Moya, Ford Focus RS WRC. Sainz and Mäkinen enjoyed a great battle; going into the last stage it was the Spaniard who actually led.
09. Subaru technician and GNR Policeman, Subaru Impreza WRC 2001. A rock broke the front suspension of Petter Solberg’s Subaru, which was fixed in the rain by one of Prodrive’s finest technicians.
10. Luis Moya, Carlos Sainz, Risto Mannisenmäki, Tommi Mäkinen & Marcus Grönholm. Champagne for the winners, never more deserved.
