It features a hatch, but not to a place to put your shopping. Not unless you want it cooked by the time you get home.
It's still convenient though, that binding connection between all cars with a hatch, only for the mechanics in the service area for drivers such as Stig Blomqvist.
In reality there is no boot – the car served a purpose to get the required homologation papers to enter Group B rallying, not for mass-market domination – and it’s technically a clamshell. But because the rear bodywork is sort of on backwards, and the hinge is on the roof rather on the tail like a true clamshell, the rear body lifts up in the same way it does on the rest of the 30-plus cars of the hatchback display at Sunday’s Scramble.
Semantics.
Anyway, rather than find their Happy Shopper bag (it was the 1980s), most would prefer to lift up the rear hatch to find those twin shocks that spiral out of each corner to meet the mid-mounted turbocharged 1800cc four-cylinder.
Its competition outings were limited thanks to a combination of troubled testing and development and the shocking demise of Group B, but it struck a chord. Going rallycrossing at venues such as Lydden Hill and a muddy Brands Hatch helped cement its place in automotive lore.
The car that will be among the hatches of the sold-out Scramble on Sunday will be fresh from restoration at Tolman Motorsport, who also provided a Lancia Delta for the High Smileage Club display of January.
By no means will it be the only from the Blue Oval. Expect both generations of the original fast Fiesta, the XR2 – one of which will be coming from the Ford heritage collection in Daventry. Joining it will be one of the classics of the moment, the first generation Focus RS. It is also perhaps the cleanest of all Focus RS designs. See the quartet of Fast Fords by Building 123 scattered among the hatches of the main lawn.
