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.....feel he's yet mastered the beast, but both driver and navigator are pleasantly surprised at the lack of structural damage following some very rough treatment in the stone age quarries favoured by local event organisers. The car seems to have held together remarkably well.
Robin approached it with trepidation, the more so after listening to the inevitable predictions of doom from the Motor Club Doubt Squad. He was also mindful of what he'd read about mid-engined cars like the Stratos, and with only two years of competition driving experience he was, to say the least, lacking in confidence as the Fiesta, navigated (naturally) by Andrew Taylor, tackled its first rally.
"My first reaction was at how negative everything was. The car didn't appear to have any vices; it was a lot less sideways to drive, but then I was frightened that I might break it, especially as it was a rough event. I kept thinking about all those joints"... (there is about £400 worth of rose joints in this Fiesta) ... "and I wasn't committed. But after halfway Andrew got me fired up a bit, and quite suddenly I found we were setting stage times among the top five with ease.
"As soon as you drive it with confidence, that act alone transforms the car. Traction really was great, and we found we could beat conventional 2-litre BDAs and BDGs with linle effort on stages. The car seems very stable; it's difficult to spin, but when it does - say you lose it while flat-out in fifth - it seems to go on revolving for ever!"
Ford Escort DR3 - . . . .would put some works cars to shame
Think of the best prepared, privately built and entered rally car you've ever seen...chances are that it won't stand comparison with Paul Windsor's stunning mid-engined Escort OR3. It's true to say that the DR (David Rees) 3 puts an embarrassing number of works cars to shame, so perhaps comparison with other privately entered machinery is not strictly fair.
Paul, who for many years has been associated with his family's Liverpool-based haulage firm, David Rees and Co. Ltd., and who is now managing its garage interests, is a stalwart rally privateer of many years standing.
A man who tends to prefer tarmac events rather than those taking place in the forests, he's at least as well known in Ireland and the Isle of Man as he is in England, and one of his long standing trademarks is a powerful, well presented and prepared motorcar-the DR3 is thus a supreme tribute to Paul and his mechanic John Brunskill, who together have planned and built a prototype motorcar of which the Ford Motor Company itself ceuld be proud.
Paul Windsor's most recent rally appearances have been at the wheel of a G2 Fiesta, a car prepared to a Boreham specification with Boreham supplied parts that nevertheless cost Paul considerably more to build than the DR3.
Thoroughly disenchanted with the lack of assistance and interest shown by Ford Competitions Department in a car that the latter had themselves created, and not particularly happy to be languishing in the 1600cc G2 classes after several years of driving high quality G4 machinery, Paul found to his frustration that he was unable to sell the expensive Fiesta, despite its immaculate.....
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