In one corner you had the reigning and double champion, desperate to become the first driver to win three British Rally Championships on the spin. In the other, a double US rally champion with bucket loads of BRC class success but never the overall title to match.
One driver had a very concerted plan of attack, the other almost fell into it by accident. For many, 2004 isn’t likely to be the first season that springs to mind from the BRC’s 66-year history, but it’s a year neither Jonny Milner nor David Higgins will ever forget.
Milner was the man to beat on British soil. Heading into 2004, he’d pocketed both the 2002 and 2003 titles alongside co-driver Nicky Beech in their Toyota Corolla WRC. But it was all change on the car front as the Yorkshireman opted for a Subaru Impreza WRC instead. “We felt the Corolla was starting to get a little long in the tooth,” Milner tells MN. “We felt that it was time to move on and so we hired a car which was a beautiful car to drive, I loved every second of it. But it was certainly more expensive to run, and
