Wild ride with Sebastian Loeb in a Citroen Xsara WRC - with VIDEO!

Monday, 29 November 2010 12:00 AM

Up, up and away - flying C4 WRC

Over 10 happy years as a motoring journalist I've been lucky enough to enjoy more than my fair share of once in a lifetime wild rides. And one of the most memorable for me, and my underwear, was a passenger ride with the legend of WRC, Seb Loeb, in the then all-conquering Citroen Xsara WRC.

And to celebrate four golden rally years for the Xsara's successor, the mighty C4 WRC, I shall do my best to recount that wild WRC ride while you enjoy some stunning shots and video of the flying C4 World Rally Car.

It was during a pre-season test in the cold, deserted and beautiful north Wales countryside that a handful of motoring journos assembled in a shivering huddle around a few rally-tents, deep in the forest.

Echoing all around us, shattering the peaceful silence into a million tiny pieces, was the rasping bark, crack and bang of what could only be one thing - a World Rally Car at full tilt, in the hands of the greatest rally driver of all time.

We knew what we were here for. We knew that Loeb would soon be taking us on the drive of our lives, but until the red and white livery and muscular wide arches of the Xsara WRC swung fully sideways into view, I for one couldn't really believe what was about to happen. I repeat: a passenger ride with Seb Loeb in his snorting WRC Citroen Xsara!

The night before I'd driven from Peterborough to a middle-of-north-Wales-nowhere hotel in a 150bhp Caterham 7; a nippy little devil in anyone's book. I was running late for the Citroen dinner and as night fell and the back-lanes darkened and emptied, I couldn't have thought of a better corner-to-corner car with which to slay the bends, zapping me to my destination.

Incredible acceleration, unbelievable brakes and the sort of grip that'd shame even the stickiest brown-stuff-to-Axminster combination; the lithe little 7 was, at that point, the most perfect driving weapon I'd ever flown in. I got to our hotel rendezvous just in time and left the Caterham ticking and pinking outside in the chill evening air. I was having a great time.

As sometimes they do, circumstances took an unexpected twist and over a darkly early breakfast I found myself offering the Caterham keys to the Citroen rally team boss, Guy Fréquelin. Now Guy's English was only a tad more advanced than my schoolboy-wasn't-listening French, but there wasn't a language barrier anywhere big enough to hide his excitement and my slightly regretful nerves, as we walked up to the bright red 7, shrouded in mist, but clearly ready to rock.

You see, Mr Fréquelin was a proven and competitive rally and sports car driver back in the day, and this was a borrowed Caterham. It's cold, slippery and misty, and now that the keys and I have parted company and there's a grinning Frenchman strapping himself into someone else's little red rocket, all that fills my head are visions of flying red blurs over Welsh rally-style humpbacked bridges, a wide-eyed passenger in one seat and a committed Gaelic rally driver reliving his youth behind a sawing steering wheel.

Mr Fréquelin turned out to be an absolute gent, only getting the 7 fully sideways around narrow blind bends a couple of times, and as luck would have it, we didn't come across any bridges. Instead, I arrive in style in the crackling Caterham, driven right into the pits by a motorsport celebrity, my breakfast happily where I left it.

I soon find myself being manhandled into another passenger seat, with a 4-point harness snapping shut between my legs and my shoulders wrenched down hard and tight - locked and loaded into the Xsara WRC.

Now rally team bosses will happily tell you that their cars make around 350bhp, but they'll never let on the torque figure - a closely guarded secret that's behind the car's catapult-like acceleration. But, rest assured, in the hands of Loeb and flowing through the Xsara's light and stiff chassis, full-time four-wheel-drive and grabbing gravel tyres, you won't be thinking of torque. You won't be able to talk.

The anti-lag kicks-in, the Xsara explodes into a whirlwind of turbo'd fury and Loeb side-steps the clutch pedal. Pencil-necks get snapped, feet lift off the floor - 'Raaaaaaarg' shouts the WRC Xsara, and this time my eyes really are wide.

This thing just absolutely will not stop. Rocks as big as your head are chewed-up and spat out and gravel chunks smash the underside like bullets as Loeb snatches through the sequential 'box on his mad mission through the forest. Trees and boulders come and go close by as Loeb dances the Xsara through the track-in-the-trees, with his little bootie'd feet dancing across the pedals - heel, toe, toe, heel - err, I can't even keep up with his feet.

Incredible anchors bite hard and my helmeted head wrenches forward, only to be wrenched back as the turbo-torque slams-in once more and the Xsara powers on. This is what it feels like to be a rag doll clutched in the fist of tantruming child. And it's awesome!

'Merci', I say as Loeb pulls us to a stop. Pathetic French I know, but my compressed grey sponge couldn't come up with anything better. 'You welcome', retorts Loeb as I fall out of the seat and into the arms of a waiting Citroen press team.

'How was it?' they ask. 'Jibber, jibber', I reply.

High...