EXTREME SHORT

I MAGINE IF YOU SPENT THE NIGHT BEFORE A flight watching videos of planes landing in high winds. As I close my laptop and switch off the bedside light, not feeling in the least bit like sleeping, I realise I’ve probably just done something equally daft. As I put my head on the pillow, all I can see are images of Hannu and Stig leaping over the rollercoaster crests of Ouninpohja. Flames spit from from the yellow and white beasts as they slew sideways at jaw-dropping speeds, the soundtrack beautiful but angry.

As I close my eyes I’m picturing Walter waltzing, his blue Adidas pumping the pedals as he splits a sea of spectators like a motorsport Moses. It’s terrifying to see the commitment as he drives blind, save for the unheard instructions from Christian. A tight left and the car looks wild, almost untameable, the revs coming in stabs as the driver wrestles to contain it. To people like me who were too young to have witnessed it in period, Group B is almost fantastical, the equivalent of knights slaying dragons.

And then the darkness ebbs, the morning arrives and before I know it I’m walking across the tarmac towards a set of those enormous box arches. Perhaps the most famous dragon of them all.

Just 20 Audi Sport Quattros were built in S1 (or Evolution 2)