Ken Block has owned a 1978 Ford Escort since 2008, but only relatively recently was it rebuilt into the machine you see above. It’s a good machine.
This particular model of Escort wasn’t sold in the U.S. Built by Ford Europe, its market was on that continent and primarily, as it happens, in Great Britain.
I’m reasonably certain that anyone who bought one of these tiny beasts back then had any expectation it might one day end up on an internet website called YouTube. (Or, for that matter, Jalopnik.)
The tape on the headlights is to reduce the spread of glass shards should they break. It also looks (sort of?) cool. Under the hood is a sequential gearbox and a naturally aspirated four cylinder that generates around 350 horsepower, taken from the late Colin McRae’s R4. Block, as he does, makes the most of it.