On Rallying's Rear-Drive Highpoint And One Of Its Greatest Champions

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Sideways Escorts, wailing BDAs, dry British announcers, and drier Finnish jokes. It's a documentary on Ari Vatanen, a year before he won the world rally championship, back when rally cars were devastatingly good looking, glorious sounding, and rear wheel drive.

It's easy to think of Vatanen as just another driver of the unhinged Group B era, or the sack of meat strapped into the Peugeots that dominated the Paris-Dakar and Pikes Peak.

But he's a real man, with a very aggressive style behind the wheel, a sense of humor, and a fantastic fashion sense if I do say so myself. This doc, 'The Vatanen Touch' gives you a better sense of the guy from before he became a champion and before he became a member of the European Parliament. On, and there's plenty of rally porn to boot.

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