Colin McRae: The Acropolis Rally King

Between 1994 and 2002, McRae led or won every Acropolis Rally he started, ultimately taking five victories in a record run which remains unbeaten today. Märtin’s ‘king’ moniker came about following the 2002 event – a rally which Markko himself came close to breaking his WRC duck on.

“I was leading the rally,” said Märtin. “Lots of people were saying it was because I had a better position on the road. Colin wasn’t interested in that. He was really cool about how our event was going and was really sympathetic when I got a puncture and didn’t win. He was the king of the Acropolis.”

McRae’s performance on a rally which demanded patience as much as pace surprised a few folk. Not M-Sport Ford managing director Malcolm Wilson. The Briton watched in awe as McRae guided one of his Ford Focus RS WRCs to a hat-trick of wins in 2000, 2001 and ’02.

“Colin had probably the best mechanical understanding of a rally car of all the drivers I worked with,” said Wilson. “People didn’t always appreciate just how sympathetic he could be with the car and how clever he could be on an event like the Acropolis.”

Driving a Subaru Impreza 555, McRae probably should have won the 1994 event – and he would have done had he not been excluded for changing the car’s windscreen after a scrutineer forgot to replace the bonnet pins, only for the bonnet to blow up and smash the screen.

From 1996 onwards, he was on it. Co-driver and fellow winner Derek Ringer remembers that first win – a highlight of their 1995 title defence.

“Colin just decided he was going to dominate the event,” said Ringer. “We took 20 seconds out of everybody in the first stage…”

He retired from the lead in 1997 and led at the end of day one in 1999 before the gearbox on his Focus cried enough. Every other year between 1996 and 2002, he won.

The king of the Acropolis indeed.

Photo: McKlein