On 22 November 30 years ago at Chester racecourse, there was smoke billowing from the wheels of a navy-blue Subaru Impreza madly spinning. These celebratory donuts were performed by newly crowned 1995 world rally champion Colin McRae, accompanied by a Saltire held by co-driver Derek Ringer flailing out of the window.
It is an image that is impossible to forget for British rally fans, and likewise rally enthusiasts the world over. There is a very real chance that this column would not exist had this writer, then aged eight and obsessed with cars, not been swept up by McRae mania in the 1990s. Tuning into the BBC coverage of the 1995 RAC Rally and hanging on every word delivered by presenter Steve Lee and the flat-capped Tony Mason, thrusting microphones into the cockpits of the crews at stages ends, remains to this day one of my most vivid motorsport memories growing up.
