| Super intervju s Colinom iz 2004...
Big Colin Interview!
To Celebrate, We're publishing this big interview with the big man himself.
You can find some new PC screenshots in the downloads section.
For reading the interview- RT is me Richard Tysoe, your intrepid CLO, CM is the man McRae, and SB is the lovely Sarah from our licensing department.
RT- Last time we spoke you said that you wanted to do Le Mans because it was a big event that everyone’s heard of- is there anything else you’d like, I dunno, Daytona or the Indy 500 or Pike’s Peak that you’d quite like to do?
CM- pike’s peak’s one that I’d love to do. Because it’s the most famous hillclimb in the world and great cars. That’s the thing, I just enjoy driving really extreme cars, and you can do that in that kind of event.
RT- That kind of leads on to the next one, because I know you’ve got a metro 6R4- so you have like a collection of classic cars- what else have you got?
CM- I’ve got most of my cars that I used. I managed to get them back again and rebuilt them to their original state. I’ve got the 6R4, and I’m building an Escort just now.
RT- what kind of escort- because it’s quite a wide…
CM- Yeah, I know, an older MKII type, a classic type car. With some modern bits and pieces on it. It’ll look like an old MKII, but it’ll be quite a special car underneath.
RT- So modern cosworth stuff in it
CM-Yeah- so just something a bit different. I’m playing around with it, really.
RT- That sounds like fun. Ok. If I gave you the keys to the world rally championship, and it’s yours to do whatever you like with, what would you do?
CM- I would change quite a lot of it, at the moment. Definitely put three cars per team back in, because that was in a couple of years ago and the idea was to bring in younger people into the sport and give them an opportunity with a third car in the team, so that’s something I would definitely put back in. I would cut back on a number of rallies because the manufacturers are complaining about the cost of the sport, and part of the big cost is the number of rallies you’ve got to go to, so I’d cut back to, maybe ten quality rallies. Change the rallies quite a bit- change the format of the events- nowadays there’s an awful lot of running around on the road or liaison sections. You’d start at five in the morning and finish at nine at night and only do four or five stages a day- that’s a lot of hanging around so obviously I’d try and get more competitive mileage into a day. And I would change the spec of the cars quite a bit as well- go back to more… maybe basic’s the wrong word, but take some of the electronic aids out of the car
RT- the active diffs, that sort of thing
CM- Yeah the active transmissions. And I would certainly- definitely go back to normally aspirated motors. I think maybe fifty percent of the spectacle’s in the noise that comes off something like that and the turbocharged engines don’t really sound brilliant.
RT- what I’ve always thought is odd is that they have a turbocharged formula, which is 2 litres, and they restrict it to about 300 bhp where, you can get 300 horsepower out of a 2-litre naturally-aspirated engine anyway. You can buy road cars approaching that much.
CM- Well, the big thing is everyone always looks at horsepower, but torque’s the thing that makes the car move, not the horsepower. I mean, a WRC car now’s got over 700 pound-feet of torque. So it’s way way over what any, any road car would ever achieve. And that’s where they get the performance from. But I would go back to normally aspirated motors and more of a basic- still keep some active stuff in the transmission, ‘cos it makes the cars great fun to drive because they’re very, very responsive. But I think they’ve gone too far that way- with yaw and G-sensors and brake systems, and basically- if it keeps going the way it’s going, rally cars in three or four years’ll be driving as if they’re on rails. And then what’s the point in going to watch something like that? Rallying’s all about driving on a loose surface and sliding the car around, and they’ve gone away from that. I would go back to that more, sort of five years ago, group A type era, when the cars were a bit more sort of- you had to manhandle more than actually drive to the electronics that are in the cars.
RT- it’s odd to think that there’s almost as many aids helping the real drivers as in the games.
CM- It’s the same in F1 at the moment, there’s a big debate as to what spec the cars should be as they’re basically driving on rails. In rallying, five or six years ago, if you had a very good driver and a mediocre car, you could still win because the driving ability would come through. Nowadays that would never happen, you’ve got to have a good car and a good driver to win.
RT- Right, well, good answer. Obviously this leads on from it a bit is that you got a fairly raw deal out of the down-to-two-cars thing, and with Richard Burns out of the picture, it’s not really a great year for British fans.
CM- no, it’s really unfortunate
RT- Do you know, do you follow, up-and-coming drivers- is there a young British guy who might be coming up? Because I’ve not really heard that much about it.
CM- Yeah, I mean what you’ve got to look at is the junior championship. We at McRae Motorsport look after a young Irish driver Chris Meeke- he finished third in the first event in Monte Carlo and we’ve had a huge gap until, next weekend, the Acropolis rally. So we, personally look after him, and he’s one of the quickest guys. I’ve obviously put a lot of money on him making it to the top as the next British driver in the limelight and the WRC.
RT- Thank you. Well, the next question I’ve got written down, you’ve already kind of answered, is this- what’s your favourite surface to drive on? From what you’ve said, I’m guessing it’s the loose stuff.
CM- yeah, the loose stuff- you know from the game there’s so many variations of loose surface, and that’s what it’s like in real life. Some of it is more difficult and not as enjoyable as other surfaces. Probably Finnish type roads- they have a sandy surface and nice consistent grip. And the other great surface to drive on is the snow and ice
RT- I suppose because you can get it sideways at low speed.. OK, next question. Dakar must have been quite an experience- just a general thing- did you enjoy it, was it a good thing to do?
CM- yeah, I enjoyed it- I’ve always loved these kind of events. They capture your imagination a bit.
SB- Extreme events
CM- Yeah extreme- and the fact that you leave in the morning and it’s basically you and your navigator in the car all day and you decide how you wanna approach it, and it’s driving all day. You’re going as fast as you can go for- I think the longest stage on Dakar was about 750 Kilometres. So it’s quite a thought when you start a stage and you think “Right, I’ve got to drive as fast as I can for 750Ks” It’s like leaving Glasgow, and driving as fast as you can to London, and some of the way back, and doing it all off-road.
SB- and that goes back to the stamina thing you were talking about earlier as well,
CM- yeah, you need a lot of stamina and concentration. It’s quite a challenge.
RT- Does it have much in common with, for want of a better word, “proper” rallying? How much of the skills you had from world rally championship competition were you able to use, because it’s a very, very different event. It’s odd that they both get called “rallying”
CM- it was different. I mean the actual driving skill you need to be competitive in WRC is higher than the driving skill you would need to compete on a raid event. So from that side of it, to go from top-level world rallying to a raid event, it is relatively easy to drive the cars at a competitive speed. What you need to be able to do is read the terrain, and a lot of WRC drivers wouldn’t be able to do that and others would. It depends on you background and where you’re coming from. So it’s just reading the terrain and judging the speed and managing to anticipate what the cars going to do on the next bump ahead and try to, obviously sand dunes are another big thing, and that’s experience. You’ve got to spend time in the sand dunes to know, that you have to watch the wind direction how the dunes are forming, if you’re going to have a smooth back or just a vertical back of the dune, and all that sort of stuff. So there’s a lot of- you know, you’re scanning all the time. Just to get clues of what’s going to be in front of you.
RT- sounds bit like sailing…
CM- yeah, you’ve go to take all sorts of things into consideration.
SB- that’s not as easy as you think it is, those sand dunes. They can just drop away on the other side, and they look like they go on for miles.
CM- and that’s what a lot of the big accidents are on Dakar- folk just going flat out over the dunes and they just drop away in front of them. So That side of it is something where experience counts. And where a WRC driver could be caught out. ‘Cos you’ve got the skill to drive the car quicker than most other people, but that means you can go quicker into a problem if there is one, especially if you can’t see it.
SB- how did you practice that. How did you prepare yourself?
CM- You’ve just got to do the event. I only spent three days in Africa in the sand dunes, just driving round basically. Picking waypoints and driving to them and working out the best way to get to them. Just getting experience of the car and the sand, how it all works. You’ve just got to do the event. The majority of Dakar, though- everyone thinks it’s hundreds of kilometres of sand dunes, but it isn’t. You get very, very little of big sand dunes that you’ve got to cross. You may get a bar of sand dunes of ten kays long and you’ve got to cross them into the flat plains again. It’s very rare to get fifty kilometres of sand dunes. Most of it’s more on flatter ground. quite well-defined roads a lot of the time. Which, from that side of it, from a WRC driver’s side of it is a bit easier.
RT- OK. What is it about you as a rally driver that makes you better than the next guy?
CM- For any successful driver, it’s confidence. Self-belief. But that’s in anything in life. If you’re confident in what you’re doing and you really believe in yourself that you can pull it off, then generally you will. And it’s just how much, where your level of confidence or ability is. It makes a difference.
RT- That leads on to the next thing- do you feel fear, at all? When you’re driving.
CM- yeah, I mean it’s always in the back of your mind. And you’ve always gotta… you’re always watching for something that can catch you out. Fear… It’s a difficult one isn’t it? Yeah- you always consider that side of it, for sure. If you didn’t- well you’d be lying if you said you didn’t. But yes, at the end of the day it’s a dangerous sport and you have to accept that and you limit the dangers as much as you can when you’re in there.
RT- Fair enough.
SB- I suppose for us it seems harder to comprehend, but that’s what you do, you have an enormous amount of experience driving rally cars and other cars- it’s what you do, so your fear is minimised where as for us it would seem that of course you’re going to be scared.
CM- It’s like anyone- Like a lumberjack, he couldn’t do his job, but for him he does it everyday of the week- he knows the risks and he knows how to avoid them, but you go and drop us in that situation cutting trees down and one would land on top of you. You’ve got to know your stuff, and know where the dangers are, so you can steer around them and see them coming.
RT- OK, right. If you could only drive one more stage in your career, any stage, any car- what would it be
CM- Any stage, any car?
RT- but it’s the last one- that’s it. It’s like desert island discs, but rallying.
SB- you can’t have a top ten, then, like on Desert island discs?
RT- we could, but we’d be here all day.
CM- ooh, it would be Finland. One of the stages in Finland. Ouninpohja (but don’t ask me how to spell it!)
RT- I’ll look it up
SB- You’re on your own…
CM- That’s probably it- a real challenging stage- very, very fast in some places, lots of huge, big jumps. Great, great fun. One of those stages, when you do, when you drive cars like that for a living, the actual buzz of driving the cars slowly diminishes over the years, so you don’t… it’s a job. But there are still certain places in the world where you get a real buzz from driving the car again, and that’s one of them.
RT- and the wheels?
CM- what would the car be? What would I like to attempt it in? probably not something that I’ve driven- because you’ve driven them, haven’t you? So I’d probably like to do it in a T16 Peugeot, an old group B.
RT- oh, the 205.
CM- The 205, yeah. Just for something different. You’ve got the challenge of the stage anyway, and you’ve got the challenge of driving a six hundred horsepower group B car.
SB- What would you do, Rich?
RT- What would I do? Something that’s not likely to get me killed. I dunno- actually I might be in quite close agreement with colin- I’ve always loved the look of the old group B cars like the 205. though I think I’d probably have the RS200
CM- Yeah
RT- and I think I’d probably want to do it on a british stage as well- support the home team. Or possibly on tarmac- I’ve always quite fancied something like a Corsica stage, just cos it’s closer to the very little proper fast driving I’ve done.
CM- so if you can organise that for me I’d appreciate it…
RT- I’ll phone round later… ok, what… obviously you’ve got a huge number of cars at your disposal- what do you take down the shops?
CM- what do I take down the shops… I need to be quite careful. I don’t really now, do I, I don’t have a contract…
RT- See, you’re free of manufacturers…
CM- but I don’t; want to give anyone too much credit…
SB- mention a couple
CM- the main car is a BMW M5, or Range Rover.
RT- OK… um, what do you do for relaxation, or what did you do for relaxation when you’re in, like the heat of competition? Because rally driving is something that a lot of normal people- ok, that’s not the right word, a lot of everyday people would do for relaxation. I’ve often wondered what sportspeople in general do to wind down…
CM- on and event, generally not a lot. Just chill out basically. Got to the gym for a wee bit, or do some cycling, or just relax in the hotel. Just keep a quiet time.
RT- OK- we now have the standard silly Codemasters question that me and my colleagues have decided to be the standard silly question that we’re going to ask celebrities from now on. What’s your favourite cheese?
CM- Favourite Cheese? There’s a… I can’t remember the name of it, there’s a wee shop in Vervier where you can buy- it’s a brie, a truffle brie cheese, but I can’t remember the proper name for it. (Rich’s note- after some research, I think this is “Boschetto al Tartufo Bianchetto”)For me that’s the best cheese in the world, and from that shop. I had it in Dubai last week, it wasn’t quite the same. It wasn’t far away, but they just get it perfect in this shop in Vervier.
RT- That in france?
CM- Switzerland.
RT- Well, thanks for the interview, next time in Switzerland, I shall check out the truffle brie.
Big thanks to colin for taking the time to have what was, for me, a very entertaning time interviewing.
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