Ride onboard with World Rally hero Colin McRae as he hurls his Group B MG Metro 6R4 along the lanes of the Carnhill stage during one of Ireland’s biggest motorsport events – the Donegal Rally – in 2006.
The late and very great McRae and co-driver Nicky Grist, who guided the Scot to 17 of his 25 WRC wins for Subaru and Ford between 1997 and 2002, are flat-out in the 30-year-old Austin Rover-built 3-litre V6 pocket rocket, setting the sort of pace you’d expect from one of the sport’s greatest stars – indeed he was embarrassing many of the much more modern and sophisticated WRC machines in the classic asphalt event.
And then McRae pulls off one of the saves of the century as he locks the rear brakes and pirouettes at high speed down an escape road on the outside of a junction, somehow avoiding everything solid.
With a chuckle and a few colourful expletives, McRae restarts the 6R4, finds first gear and gets straight back on it.
As the great man once said: ‘If in doubt, flat out!’