Six Unusual Race Cars
This weekend saw the Dakar Rally get underway in Saudi Arabia, with an entry list that includes an unusual name embarking on a major motorsport programme for the first time.
Dacia isn’t the first manufacturer that comes to mind when you think about one of the most challenging events on global motorsport, but the Romanian brand is represented with a three-car entry going up against the likes of Toyota and Ford in the fight for overall honours.
Five-time winner Nasser Al-Attiyah sits inside the top ten overall after the opening four stages of the event although WRC legend Sebastien Loeb how already bowed out after an incident on stage three that damaged his car.
Dacia’s assault on the event is one that will appear to be left field to the general public, and we’re using the Dakar challenger to kick off a look at six unusual race cars from through the years...
DACIA SANDRIDER:
The Sandrider shares little with the Dacia models that you see on the road, having been developed alongside motorsport powerhouses Prodrive.
The four-wheel drive buggy features a lightweight steel tube chassis and carbon fibre body parts that are designed to deal with the robust nature of rally raid competition.
Power comes from 3.0l twin-turbo V6 engine linked to a six-speed sequential gearbox, whilst there is an impressive 350mm of suspension to deal with the challenges that come from racing in the desert.
Given stages run for hundreds of kilometres at a time, the car also has a fuel tank capable of carrying in excess of 500 litres of fuel, with the design of the car including large ‘vents’ on the side in which spare wheels are located should they be required.
PEUGEOT 806:
The Peugeot 806 is far from being one of the most memorable models that the French manufacturer has produced but has an unlikely place in motorsport history thanks to the 1995 Spa 24 Hours.
Peugeot’s Belgium arm tasked the Kronos Racing team with turning an 806 into a race car for the annual endurance race, which is did in impressive fashion.
The car featured many of the underpinnings of a Peugeot 405 Super Touring car – as seen in the BTCC in the 1990s – with the engine block originally fitted to a Group A Peugeot 306.
Seen by many as a gimmick, the car qualified third in class and just outside the top ten overall before retiring ten hours into the race with mechanical issues.
VOLVO 850:
Perhaps the best known unlikely race car is the Volvo 850 that competed in the British Touring Car Championship in 1994, and which is now regarded as one of the most iconic machines in series history.
Volvo was joining the grid for the first time and surprised everyone during the season launch when it revealed two estate cars having kept the idea secret – to the extent that driver Rickard Rydell had no idea he’d be racing an estate when he signed his deal.
The decision was largely a marketing exercise to generate interest, which the car achieved with ease. Results were slightly more difficult to come by however with fifth place for Rydell at Oulton Park and the same finish for Jan Lammers at Brands Hatch being the best the 850 Estate managed before being replaced by the saloon model for 1995.
LADA GRANTA:
Although LADA exited the UK market in the late 1990s, it’s cars continue to be the butt of many jokes to this day – so it was a surprise when the Russian manufacturer decided to enter the World Touring Car Championship and go up against the likes of BMW, Chevrolet and SEAT.
Initially a privateer programme with the ageing 110 model before LADA introduced the Priora in 2009, it would be the introduction of the Granta in that saw the manufacturer make an impression in the series having signed British duo James Thompson and Rob Huff to drive the cars in 2014.
Huff would score wins with the car in both China and at Macau en-route to tenth in the standings to make the Granta a success on track whilst its replacement - the Vesta - would also be a race winner.
SSANGYONG MUSSO:
Head to Australia and attend a round of the Supercars Championship and you’ll be able to see the spectacle of pickup truck racing in the SuperUtes Series, which features models like the Ford Ranger, the Isuzu D-Max and the Toyota Hilux.
The UK briefly had a similar championship of its own when SsangYong launched a one-make series for the Musso in 2017; the SsangYong Musso Pickup Racing Challenge.
Trucks were largely standard aside from the safety modifications like a roll cage and the addition of racing shock absorbers, with the engine being the same 2.2 litre diesel unit found on road-going vehicles.
Up to a dozen trucks would compete across the single season for the Challenge, with drivers including future BTCC racer James Gornall and Michael O’Brien, who went on to race as a factory GT driver for McLaren.
SKODA OCTAVIA:
Skoda has a long and rich motorsport history dating back to the early 1900s although it was in the 1990s that the Czech manufacturer really started to make an impression on the global stage with a rally versions of both the Favorit and the Felicia.
Skoda had hopes of competing at the highest levels of the sport but there was an element of surprise when the car chosen to take the fight to the likes of Toyota, Subaru, Mitsubishi and Ford was the Octavia.
The Octavia WRC debuted in 1999 and was used through to the middle of 2023, when it was replaced by the Fabia WRC – although 2002 was the only year in which the car contested every event.
The car was strong and reliable – as seen by a podium finish on the 2001 Safari Rally – but wasn’t as nimble or dynamic as the opposition, with the sheer size of the Octavia working against it.
The Fabia has gone on to be a huge success across various regulation cycles, with hundreds of cars in action across the globe.