Everyone loves the World Rally Championship (WRC), unless they’re fielding a team and paying a boatload of money to first buy and then maintain and repair a car (such as the Ford-made Fiesta WRC). That’s the problem that the Fiesta R5 attempts to address, as it costs 40 percent of a WRC car while being nearly as powerful and as fast. Made by M Sport and weighing the same as a WRC car, the Fiesta R5 accomplishes those feats by utilizing off-the-shelf parts seen on today’s road cars.
EVO’s (lucky) Henry Catchpole gets to pilot one on the public streets of the lake district. Unsurprisingly, the car is fast, with Henry describing the torque as being the equivalent of “a fiercely concentrated blast from a McLaren 12C under full acceleration.” The clutch is heavy, the steering — direct and precise, the interior — loud. And slicing through a chicane “with millimeters to spare has never felt easier”.
In the video, Managing Director of M-Sport Malcolm Wilson said that “this is where rallying needs to go.” He believes that the R5 will bring “a lot more people back into rally” — which we interpret to be those who would otherwise be turned away based on the necessary financial investment.
Watch Henry drive the Fiesta R5 on the open road, and then be driven around a rally course by a professional WRC driver in this video:
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