RAC Rally
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The forerunner of the RAC Rally series was the 1932 Torquay rally which was the first major rally of the modern era in Great Britain. The 341 competing cars were unmodified - just as could be bought from your local showroom.
Ten starting points spread around the country were chosen and the selected finishing point for the 1,000 mile long routes was Torquay. As well as completing the route to a time schedule the competitors were required to perform special tests and a concours d'elegance was held at the finish.
The first officially designated RAC Rally was held the following year and followed a similar format but with Hastings as the chosen finishing point for the 300 plus competitors. The finishing points for the following years were 1934 - Bournemouth, 1935 - Eastbourne, 1936 - Torquay, 1937 - Hastings, 1938 - Blackpool, 1939 - Brighton. The series was suspended for the war years and resumed in 1951 finishing at Bournemouth.
The Lombard RAC Rally 1986 was the last European Event for the full blown Group B Legends.
Following a scruitineering scandal on the Sanremo, the Peugeot team were apprehensive before the event but they passed. After which they decide to appeal about Sanremo result. The Peugeot of Timo Salonen won, with Markku Alen in the Lancia 2nd, Juha Kankkunen 3rd and Mikael Sundstrom in 4th. There were three Peugeots in the top four. The sole remaining Ford RS 200 was in 5th place with Kalle Grundel at the wheel. The event was also a major success for Austin Rover who won the teams prize with the Metro 6r4, with their drivers in 6th Tony Pond, 7th Jimmy McRae, 8th Per Eklund and 9th David Llewellyn. Ingvar Carlsson rounded out the top 10 in the Group A Mazda Famillia 4WD. There were 83 finishers out of 150 starters.