It's that time again - Wales Rally GB kicks off this weekend.
Don't worry, we're not going to turn this into a 'things aren't as good as they used to be' - although obviously feel free to if the mood takes you. Rather it's a perfect excuse to celebrate one of the most remarkable drives the former RAC Rally ever saw - Stig Blomqvist's run to third in a two-wheel drive Skoda Felicia back in 1996.
Yes, the lead image isn't from Wales - this is!
Blomqvist himself needs little introduction, one of Sweden's most famous sons and World Rally Champion back in 1984. But by the mid-90s he was in the twilight of his professional career and, having helped Skoda with the development of the Felicia Kit Car, was offered what was basically a guest drive in that year's RAC. He was 50 years old.
Admittedly, this was an odd year for Britain's national rally, which - for various obscure FIA reasons - wasn't part of the World Rally Championship, but only part of the lesser 2.0-Litre World Championship. That meant few top WRC drivers competed, but the entry list was still packed with talented F2 drivers and top-flight privateers, with serious machinery including two works Toyota Celica GT-Fours, with the event marking the factory team's return from a 12-month ban for cheating with a folding air restrictor.
At which point we'll let the video take up the story. It seems to have been made by Skoda Motorsport, explaining some of the voiceover's slightly odd phrases and references to "our boys", but it still tells the tale of the whole event. (And, on the plus side, you don't have to listen to Tony Mason.) Winter arrived early that year, the weather was extremely cold and conditions were both snowy and icy. Blomqvist (and the Skoda factory drivers) attack from the beginning, and by the end of the first day the Swede is leading the whole event.
It certainly helped that the rally soon turned into a race of attrition, with the treacherous conditions claiming many - including Juha Kankkunen in the lead Toyota and F2 front-runners Gwyndaf Evans and Robbie Head. But by the end of the event - still three days in those days - Blomqvist and co-driver Benny Melander have held onto third, 15 minutes down on winner Armin Schwarz's Celica GT-4, but seven minutes clear of fourth placed Mark Higgins's Nissan Sunny GTI - and with dozens of four-wheel drive Escorts, Lancers and Imprezas further down the order.
Stig comes about as close as he ever does to smiling on the finishing ramp. The man is a legend.