Landspeed

It isn’t all that surprising that the Subaru Legacy’s works rally career has been somewhat overshadowed by the Impreza which followed, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t take the time to revisit all that it achieved.

Over the years, Subaru UK has created some of the most iconic – and desirable – special edition Impreza and WRX models that the world has ever seen. Always tuned in to what the enthusiast wants, and cleverly taking its cues from the motorsport successes and driving heroes of the hour, Subaru UK’s family album of notable cars is worthy of closer inspection. We take a closer look with our very own latter-day Subaru salesman and tuner and present-day six-star geek, Paul Cowland..

Without doubt the most important development in the field of automotive wheel technology since, well, the wheel, Carbon Revolution design and manufacturer one-piece carbon fibre wheels for some of the most exclusive performance cars in the world. The latest model to receive bespoke Carbon Revolution hardware is the R8, specifically the first generation Type 48 model.

Last weekend saw Olly Clark and Gobstopper II make yet another successful assault on Goodwood's famous hill Last year saw Roger Clark Motorsport (RCM) set the outright fastest time of the Goodwood Festival of Speed weekend, success the team built upon this year by once again topping the time sheets in their specially prepared Subaru Impreza Time Attack car, Olly Clark powering up the hill in a breathtaking 46.29 seconds.

Group B cars have quite rightly gone down in history as the ultimate rally machines. They were faster, more powerful and harder to drive than anything that came before. The story of how the likes of the RS200, the Delta S4, the S1E2 and the 205T16 found themselves out in the cold is as well known as it is tragic, the deaths of spectators and both Henri Toivonen and Sergio Cresto bringing the curtain down on the World Rally Championships most insane period.

We take a closer look at the Nissan GTI-R, a car that looked to have all the traits of an outright rally winner, yet ultimately failed to deliver the goods Nissan and rallying have a long and fruitful association, one which stretches right back to the ‘60s, through the ‘70s and into the early ‘80s. Cars like the Datsun 240Z and Violet earned a reputation for toughness and reliability, traits which no doubt helped in their success on long distance tests of endurance like the classic Safari, an event Datsun-Nissan won 4 times.

In the first of a new series called 'Born Under a Bad Sign,' we take a look back at some of the heroic failures of professional motorsport Succeeding in the cut-throat world of professional motorsport is anything but easy, and this even applies to manufactures with massive budgets, teams of engineers and everything else associated with the sport.