Lots left in Alister's tank

Published on Saturday 14 November 2009 20:57

IN THE last year he's done everything from complete the Paris-Dakar Rally in a dune buggy he built himself to hurtling through the wilds of New Zealand's rugged south island, coming within minutes of winning their blue-riband rally before his car's engine blew.

A fortnight ago he was at home with his Aussie wife Tara and two kids in Perth, Western Australia; last week was spent tearing around the teak forests of Indonesia and as you read this he's thrashing the nuts off a works Proton as he charges up a mountainside in central China.

If he's reached a time in life when he should be slowing down, Alister McRae has not heard anyone mention it to him. Despite turning 39 next month, this scion of the first family of Scottish motorsport is still piling into challenges with the same gusto he once displayed as a teenage motocross prodigy until his biking career was cut short by two shattered ankles.

Despite being the least-heralded driver in his family, the youngest McRae has made up for a relative lack of trophies with an impressive longevity. Family tragedy, fatherhood, living on the far side of the world, an economic downturn that has obliterated sponsorship opportunities for committed privateers: none of that has been enough to put McRae's wagon off the road.

"It's simple. I do it because I still love it, absolutely love it," he said when asked whether the long absences from kids Emmie and Max, the living out of hotel rooms, the period spent scratching around for sponsorship, is still worth it. "It's what I've done all my life and I get a buzz out of competing that you can't get from anything else. As long as I'm competitive I'll keep on going, and that could be some time – look at my dad, he's 66 and still going strong so I have a bit of time left yet."

McRae's career has been given a new lease of life by his involvement in the Asia-Pacific Rally Championship and the Intercontinental Rally Challenge (IRC) as a works driver for Proton, driving their Satira Neo S2000. Proton may be to automotive excellence what Rab C Nesbitt is to haute couture over here, but in rallying the Malaysian company is a big fish, and driving for them in races one step down from the World Rally Championship is a big deal.

Just how big will become clear in Perthshire next weekend when McRae competes in the Rally of Scotland, the last leg of the IRC. It's the first time in two decades that an event of this stature has been held in Scotland, and McRae's presence in a race that begins in Aberfoyle and snakes around the hillsides and forests of the Trossachs will be one of the highlights of Scotland's and McRae's sporting year.

"I'm really, really looking forward to it, especially as it'll be such a contrast to the China Rally," he says. "Out here we're 450kms south west of Shanghai, right up in the hills. There are no tourists, no one speaks English and it's really like a glimpse into a completely alien world.

Rallying in Scotland is much more familiar to me, and although it'll be really challenging it'll also be a fantastic experience. Although it's going to be very competitive, with drivers like Kris Meeke very difficult to beat, we'll be there hoping to be on the podium."

Meeke's stunning form this season for Peugeot actually makes it more likely that McRae will find himself on the podium. The Ulsterman has already won the championship, so a host of would-be contenders from Jan Kopecky, Juha Hanninen and Giandomenico Basso through to Anton Alen, Nicolas Vouilloz and Freddie Loix have absented themselves. Although McRae will still face a stiff challenge from the likes of Cork-based Keith Cronin and Guy Wilks, a podium finish is still likely if he finishes the race in one piece.

That is never a given, though McRae is confident of seeing the race through. Despite making a new life thousands of miles away, he says his trips back to Blighty have been so frequent that he has had little chance to miss his homeland and was racing on much of this course as recently as last year.

That's when he took place in the McRae Stages Rally, an event held in September 2008 as a commemoration and celebration of his brother Colin's life after the former World Rally champion and his five-year-old son Johnny died in a helicopter crash in 2007. Much of that race, which was won by Alister, was run over the same roads that Thursday's race will cover. Unsurprisingly, Alister's memory of that race has little to do with gravel notes or technical details.

"I won the Classic class at the McRae Stages Rally, but what I really remember was the sheer emotion of it all," he says. "The crowds were huge, just like they were when I was a kid, and that's what helped me through."

As with his dad Jimmy in the immediate months after Colin's death, Alister found that competing gave him small windows of peace when he was able to focus on something other than his loss. "It was tough, but once you start driving you forget about everything else."

Even if he wanted to, it would be impossible for Alister to escape the long shadow cast by his brother's death. His drives in Britain have had some subtext that includes Colin. There was the time in 2007 at Wembley when he stepped in to take Colin's place in the Race of Champions just two months after Colin's death. Earlier this year, Alister and Jimmy made an emotional appearance at 25th anniversary of the Kames Motorsport Complex, the track where the two brothers first raced together, auctioning off passenger drives in aid of Colin's Vision Charity.

It is, says Alister, times like that and like this week's Rally of Scotland that remind him of Colin and the good times. "I've got so many good memories of Colin to keep me going," he says. "Even though he's not there, being back racing in Scotland reminds me of those days, and that's reason enough to come back. It's going to be a great week."