Ford Australia ran a short-lived rally program in the mid-2000s, with strong links to both the WRC and V8 Supercars, but it wasn’t the fairytale story that might have been expected.
On an episode of RallySport Magazine’s DustTrails Podcast, released in 2021 and now available for free via the Motorsport Podcast Network, Peter Whitten goes in-depth with the team’s driver at that time, Michael Guest.
The ex-Hyundai WRC driver outlines the ‘promise’ made to him at the beginning of the Ford program and the all-too-quick shift to a brand-new platform, that of the internationally-renowned Ford Fiesta S1600.
Initially only available as a front-wheel-drive car homologated for international rallies, the Fiesta was then developed into a Super 2000 car with a four-wheel-drive system thanks to a newly-minted contract with Jason Bright’s Britek Motorsport.
The move to Bright’s operation was after a sub-standard season aboard a rear-wheel-drive Ford Focus that was oversold to Guest based on lofty targets that Ford’s R&D team were not close to reaching.
After the initial 2006 season in the Focus, the moves came.
“There were two key decisions made,” Guest said. “The first was to build the Super 2000 Fiesta and the second was to move the whole operation to Jason Bright’s V8 Supercar team.
“We brought some other engineers on with European backgrounds, and it was a big ask to build the first Ford Super 2000 car in the world, mind you. I think people forget that.
“We ended up buying two of those Super 1600 cars and then the boys built a gearbox tunnel for it and created this fantastic Super 2000 prototype car, which was really exciting.”
Exciting, yes, but a program that was cut short by a sudden decision from Ford at the end of the car’s first competition year in 2007.
Between Guest and second driver, Darren Windus, the Britek Ford team, with support from Pirtek, won stages and finished on the podium that year, but the patience and funding weren’t there to continue.
“Everybody just expects because it’s (the) Ford factory that you’re just going to rock out with this highly competitive car from the word go, and it just doesn’t work like that,” Guest added, commenting on the need for the team to continue the development of the cars.
“From the outside looking in, the decision to go to Britek seemed quite odd at the time because they had virtually as little rally experience as Ford did. If I’d had the decisions, I would have done it a lot differently to that.”
Guest is also asked about the constant talk at the time that some of the Ford rally money was being shoehorned into the Britek Supercars program.
“The financial side of things never ended well,” Guest adds.
“I know, personally, there were monies that I wasn’t paid that I should have been paid out of there. It didn’t end up well at all in that respect.
“I think Brighty’s mob probably underestimated what it was going to cost to run that program properly. They think, ‘It’s just a rally car, we can just make this happen,’ but when you’ve got SADEV gearboxes and Mountune engines (you get) pretty expensive little cars.”
The full episode of the chat with Michael Guest is available via your favourite podcast platforms, alongside all other DustTrails episodes.
