Bonus: Autocar Meets Malcolm Wilson of M-Sport
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Company
Anderson EV
Anderson EV makes chargers that you can install at home to charge electric cars. They focus on quality and design, making it easier for you to power your electric vehicle at home.
Concept
M Sport
M Sport is a team that builds and races cars in rally competitions. They are known for their expertise in making fast and competitive rally cars.
Concept
FIA
The FIA is the organization that oversees car racing events around the world. They make the rules for races and help ensure that everything is safe and fair for drivers and teams.
Term
WRC
WRC is a big rally racing series where cars compete on different types of roads and conditions. Winning in WRC is a big deal in the racing world.
Term
GT racing
GT racing is a type of car racing where sports cars compete against each other. These cars are built for speed and can be very powerful.
Brand
Bentley
Bentley is a famous car brand that makes very expensive and luxurious cars. They are known for their high quality and performance.
Concept
Bathurst 1000
The Bathurst 1000 is a famous car race in Australia where teams compete in long-distance racing. It's known for its challenging track and is a big event in the racing calendar.
Car
Jaguar Ipace
The Jaguar I-Pace is an electric car that looks like an SUV and is designed to be both powerful and environmentally friendly.
Concept
World Rally Championship
The World Rally Championship is a racing series where cars compete on different types of roads and terrains. It's known for its exciting and challenging races.
Concept
British GT Championship
The British GT Championship is a racing series in the UK where sports cars compete against each other. It's popular and features many different car brands.
Car
Ford Ranger
The Ford Ranger is a type of pickup truck made by Ford. It's designed for both work and play, making it great for carrying things and driving off-road.
Concept
off-road
Off-road means driving on surfaces that aren't smooth like roads, such as dirt or rocks. Some vehicles are built to handle these tough conditions better than regular cars.
Car
Ford Raptor
The Ford Raptor is a tough truck made for driving on rough roads and trails. It has a strong engine and special features that help it handle tough conditions, making it popular for off-roading.
Concept
Dakar
The Dakar Rally is a tough race that happens every year, where vehicles drive through very difficult places like deserts and mountains. It's one of the hardest races for cars and trucks.
Term
shakedown
A shakedown is a test drive to make sure a car is working well before a big race. It helps to catch any problems early.
Term
engineers
Engineers are people who design and fix cars to make sure they work well in races. They help improve how fast and safe the cars are.
Brand
Ford
Ford is a well-known car company from the United States that makes many types of vehicles.
Concept
rally cars
Rally cars are built for racing on different types of roads, including dirt and gravel. They have special features that help them drive fast and safely in tough conditions.
Concept
GT3 races
GT3 races are competitions where specially designed sports cars race against each other, following certain rules to ensure fairness and safety.
Term
mass
Mass is how heavy a car is. A lighter car usually drives better and is easier to control, especially on a race track.
Concept
LMDH
LMDH is a type of racing that includes hybrid cars, which use both traditional fuel and electric power. It's part of a series of races that focus on endurance, like the famous Le Mans race.
Brand
Citroën
Citroën is a car brand from France that makes various types of vehicles. They are well-known for their involvement in rally racing, where they have had a lot of success.
Concept
Fiorano test track
The Fiorano test track is a special racetrack where Ferrari tests its cars. It's located in Italy and helps them make sure their cars perform well.
Car
Chevrolet Monte Carlo
The Chevrolet Monte Carlo is a type of car that was made in the U.S. for many years, known for being stylish and fun to drive. It was popular especially in the 70s and 80s, and many people remember it fondly because it was also used in car racing, making it a significant part of car culture.
Company
BYD
BYD is a car company from China that makes electric cars and batteries. They are very popular for their electric vehicles.
Car
Aston Martin Dbx
The Aston Martin DBX is a fancy SUV made by a well-known British car company. It’s special because it combines the style and speed of a sports car with the space and comfort of an SUV, making it a great choice for people who want a luxurious ride that can also carry more passengers or luggage.
LIVE
Welcome to a new episode of Auto Car Meets, the bonus podcast from Auto Car. It's brought
to you as ever in association with Anderson EV, makers of premium home electric car chargers.
Visit Anderson-EV.com for more on these British designed and built chargers. Contact them
directly if you'd like £50 off before the end of October. I'm Matt Pryor and this week Steve
Cropley and I meet Malcolm Wilson, former rally driver, founder of Race and Rally's team M Sport
and deputy president for sport at the FIA. Welcome to this episode of Auto Car Meets. Hello Stephen.
Hello mate. Stephen, where are we today and who are we seeing? Well we are at Dovenby Hall which
is a long way north of where our normal beat. We're just near Cockermouth at M Sport, the headquarters
of the business built by Malcolm Wilson and we're here to meet the man himself because we are
going to be here in a week or two with a whole bunch of road cars and we thought we would come
and talk a little bit about the business before we actually arrived and in the hope that he might
be around when the road cars arrive and he can have a go in some of them and talk about it.
Yeah so Malcolm, welcome to the podcast. Thank you. Well I certainly hope I'm around
because it sounds like an exciting collection so yeah I look forward to that day. Yeah it'll be
good. Of course we were just talking slightly before this program started. I was saying that
you're known for a number of things, British rally champion, bloke that built a career as a top rally
driver, stepped out of that and built the business instead, went on to great things, WRC wins
championships indeed, am I right? And then along came Bentley and you had years of success in GT
racing and on and on but I have not rehearsed well enough what you've been doing since and I
thought I would ask for an update. So what's been happening? The last time I was here was
during Covid and you let me hold the Bentley, Bentley had won the Bathurst 1000 trophy and
that was, so it must have been 2001 or something? 2002, 2021. 2020 it was Covid yeah wasn't it?
Because Bathurst was just pre-Covid so yeah okay from that point onwards yeah I mean
well first of all I want to talk about Bathurst because it was one of our greatest best victories
to be honest with the Bentley and I mean we'd come very close I think a couple of years before
that to win in the event so to actually go there and win it because it's just an incredible track
and it just I don't know we just everybody just got so much satisfaction from winning
such a great race and then of course sadly Covid happened and at that point in time we were 75%
finished building our new facility, the test track and the new manufacturing facility
so that was a very difficult period and then of course while Covid was happening
Bentley decided that they were going to stop the race program which was obviously
quite a big setback for us all here because especially just after on the back of winning
Bathurst you can imagine we thought wow we've got a great season ahead and okay the season
continued but we knew that at the end of the season we were they were stopping and then
literally a month after that at that point in time we were running the Jaguar I-Pace trophy as well
oh of course you were and we were two years into the three-year contract and then Jaguar decided
they were going to stop that as well and I had this massive investment going on in the new facility
oh because of the electric yeah and then so of course you know losing two major programs with a
massive investment going on it was a really difficult period and of course with Covid as well
and obviously then having to lay around about 100 people off
so 2020 will not go down as one of my favorite years should we say
but presumably I mean you you've faced these sorts of difficulties before haven't you what
what do you do at a time like that I think of other things yeah I mean you've just got you've
still got to have belief but I mean at the end of the day what's the really upsetting thing is that
you know for me every business is about the people and you know to have to make people redundant
that had probably been here many many years and been great servants to the company you know
I've had to do it twice in my life when Ford decided to withdraw from World Rally in 2013 and
then obviously in 2020 and I hope it's something that I don't have to go through again in my
time here as running M Sport because it's yeah it's for me the business is all about the people and
it's so so difficult yeah and then of course shortly after that we had Brexit and I think
commercially that is that is without question the the worst thing that's happened to me business-wise
in my entire 40 odd years in business and you know we're still feeling the impact of that today
is that because it sort of scuppered the business from European customers then yeah it doesn't
scuppered it completely but you know 80 percent of our business was was outside the UK wow and
of course it's just made it so difficult for customers to deal with us you know the you know
we've had an example this week of stuff going to a customer in Czech Republic who's going to do
Morocco cross-country event the engine was cleared customs in Czech but hadn't we hadn't been cleared
in London and it was just and then the batteries there was an issue and it's just it's just constant
so what you're finding now is that you know a lot of the people it's just too much hassle
to to do with the UK yeah I mean we're very fortunate in one sense that all our fast moving
product and our lower priced sort of fiesta rally three four and five they're all based in our
Polish operation so that's that's a real saving for us in one sense that because I think if we'd
had that side of the business here as well it would have been it would have been a disaster
do you engineer those cars here and make them no in fairness Poland is very much like here it's a
one-stop shop design development build the cars test the cars and run some of the cars for the
on different programs so in fact devolving the business has been a bit of a savior clearly
a big savior to be honest yeah I mean that's the one thing that Poland in all of this COVID
Brexit that has not been affected so that's been a real godsend as you say to have have
have the base in Poland which now employs around I think it's just around 80 people
presumably that means the cars are good you know they they they wouldn't be continuing to be
successful or sell and be successful no I mean the guy matching for the guy who runs
my Polish operation he's he's does a fantastic job out there and he's got again he's got a
great team of people and yeah he's built some really really successful products in the rally
three four and five category how long have you had a Polish operation just because it gives a bit
of a timeline of how you've built how you've built this bit of the business it was around 2012-2013
basically we rented a facility to start with and then
I to be honest it's I wanted to create something that was totally different to what we have here
in the fact that I said to the guy who runs the operation for me I said look
I will consider having an M Sport in Poland but it has to be the exact opposite to what
doesn't be is he said well what do you mean I said it has to be a maximum of 10 minutes away
from the airport not two hours like it is for me to get to Manchester and so that was that was
the requisite that he had to yeah so in fairness we've got a fantastic place literally it's adjacent
to the main runway at Krakow and literally 10 minutes from getting off the plane I can be in the
office so it's a great location and do you spend you obviously spend some time with a good deal of
time over there no um very fortunate I've got such a good guy running and in magic so in fairness
it's probably it's actually probably 12 months since I've it's at least 12 months since I've been
there wow he's been here actually for the last he's just gone he's been here for the last couple
of days um but no my my time schedule at the moment is pretty hectic so so what happened at
Dovenby what um Bentley decided to stop Brexit came along etc what but but you know there are
plenty of cars parked outside it's still in operation what what what happens here um well
in fairness we went after that period of time we went down to around about 130 employees
but in fairness since then we've built back up we're now back up to two between 230 and 240
employees here um so you could hire back some of the people that went yes and then uh then we were
we were very lucky that Ford then decided that they wanted to get into cross country and um
obviously that big push on commercial vehicles as you're aware um so we had a visit from from
Jim Farley came he wanted to come and see how the sort of the business model worked here with
what we did on the rally side and and the msrt with the transits and the and the ranger pick-up
snapping and while he was here he he he obviously could see what we were all about and said that's
then when he said right i want to get into cross country we want to be there we want to be the kings
of off-road uh so then we were tasked with doing a you know a proposal to um to look at building
a specific vehicle for Dakar and and that's turned out to be the raptor x plus is it um raptor something
i just thought it was a raptor okay the raptor is good you must have enjoyed meeting Jim Farley
i mean he's a he's a proper race man isn't he a competition man it's it's incredible to have
someone like that so um you know motorsport focused at the head of the company and did he
drive any cars it goes with its precious mind we're definitely under pressure to win Dakar
that's what i bet yeah when did you start that was was that a direct result of Farley calling in
i think it was a it was obviously on his radar but then i think it probably part of the reason why
he wanted to make the visit to see what our capabilities and what what we had here was
were we probably capable of doing this because it's a very important project to him sure um
so i think it was just a case of wanting to come make sure that it was probably the right decision
to come with us to do the project for him was he impressed i've been here with two other forward
bosses Lewis Booth Jack Nasser and they were both totally blown away by the by just by the level at
which the quality and so on would you please ask Jim that yeah he's not well i think i think he
must have been because obviously to then award us the Dakar project was you know it was a big
big commitment from him to give such a prestigious program to us and what's the timeline
the cars are running yeah we did our first Dakar this year with the new vehicle that
was being designed developed manufactured tested here we did it the previous year with
two vehicles that we bought from South Africa just for us to get an understanding and experience
of what Dakar was all about so we learned a lot this year and then since then we've
done an evolution version so we'll be using that we'll be running all the four cars in
Morocco in two weeks time will you go yes i will go and then that's that's our build up that's our
like final shakedown should we say towards Dakar and then the cars will come back we totally rebuilt
um to go to Dakar and they go in the end of November i think do you think Jim's going to go
to Morocco i don't you'll not go to Morocco but i we've been trying to persuade him to come to
Dakar so yeah i'm sure if we on the on the top step of the podium i'm sure i'm sure he'll be there
i'm sure he'll be there yeah that's brilliant are you pretty hands-on when you go to those events
probably not like i used to be which which probably pleases the engineers and the technicians that
i'm not i can remember you really hands-on rallies in you know not that long ago yeah i mean
at the end of the day it's something that's so close to my heart you know when the cars have
been my life i've built all my own cars in the early days and so um it's one of those things it's
you've got to try and hold me back if there's you know if there's something major happening or
you know you see things that some of the other guys don't see and it's just it never leaves you
and uh and i just know how important it is that when the car leaves the driver's got to have
total confidence you know that's that's the big thing for me given that the driver there's not
you can't the best thing you can do is give the driver the confidence in the in his product and
yeah that's such an important still it's still an important thing for me yes it's quite interesting
to me that you you've engineered and designed and engineered these cars here without a deputation
from the other side of the atlantic in fairness to say we we've had we've had more involvement now
from the other side of the atlantic with the four performance guys you know there's a lot of areas
where they've certainly helped us out things you know with the like the aero etc um but obviously
it works both ways you know um on the engine side living like that so but we do get in honestly the
technical support that we get at the moment is he's just fantastic from the Ford performance guys in
the US they um and we have a team of them actually now come to the events so we had three Ford
engineers as an example in Portugal last week on the on the Baja rally we did with Carlos
so we'll have at least the same amount in in Dakar as well will yours your cars run in in America
in we have no plans at the moment but maybe in the future yes well is it do these things turn
into customer operations or yeah we've now we will have a we will have a total of eight raptors
in in Dakar this year so we'll have the four factory cars that we run then we will run two
customer cars and then there's two other customers that will run the cars themselves wow so you know
we honestly we could i think we could probably have been even running eight or ten customer
cars this year but in all honesty i just i touched on it before um we're under obviously a lot of
pressure to win and i don't want to dilute no our resources um and i don't want to finger
point it at me from Jim well you're on too many customer cars yeah so in all honesty but there's
no question that is an area that that we we know that we can grow in the future is that but i want
to get that win under the belt first yeah it says a lot about Davenby doesn't it that you can build
even the cars you are going to build because that's a lot of work it's a lot of work yeah um
but you know we've got as you know we've got everything we've got the capacity we've got the
facility we've got the people um i mean it's what we've done since we moved here we just
kept evolving and as every year has gone by and uh don't intend to stop
when did you come here uh we we moved into here first of all we moved into the offices where
we are now in february 2000 then we moved into the workshop in april and then we had the big
opening with jack nasa and the like thank you it was first of july or first of june 2000
so was it i remember i was saying to matt on the way up i remember him being severely shocked by being
driven through win was it winlatter forest set murthy forest just the one just outside cockamaw
he um i think he was shocked about how quickly the cars went i think it's it's amazing because
last was it two or three weeks ago um we had carlos science junior yeah going with carlos
science senior really up here no over in spain where we were testing and i don't know whether
you've seen any of the footage and everything but it's it's amazing i mean and you know the one thing
that carlos got out of the car and he didn't talk about anything technically on my mechanic
he just said this is amazing you've got something here that nobody else can offer you can sit in
the car and be with you know one of the world's best drivers and you can and he was he was more
it couldn't get over what the sport had to offer which you know which applies to rally and obviously
across country and then of course the the fun of it was seen carlos junior sat beside senior saying
papa slow papa did he have a go yeah so then how was he um i wasn't there but no i think he was
well he got to the point where carlos senior was saying slow slow 90 degrees corner coming up so
amazing they're a great pair aren't they they're they're unique actually because you even see
him doing modeling jobs together yeah it's amazing they're great open-minded people i think carlos
senior's commitment is still just it's incredible after scale 63 euro and i mean honestly i mean
it's just amazing the commitment the effort that he puts into everything but he's a really
nice guy as well isn't he i i remember in fact on your time i remember interviewing him about
the different operations of driving a rally car and he talked about gear changing he talked about
braking he talked about what you do with a steering wheel and all and he was he was so
helpful so elucid you know really yeah he's he's yeah he's he's he's got better with age
yeah yeah do you still drive competitive cars um i tend to drive every new vehicle that's
been designed and developed here just to get an understanding of where the car is and because
obviously in the early stages of testing and everything we tend to just use you know young
drivers they don't probably have the experience because we're just looking for kilometers but
i always like to know that all the basics and the fundamentals are okay before you know they get
because you know when you've got a lot of these young guys they're looking they're thinking about
their careers and they don't want to be probably super critical with the engineers or the designers
so at least if i can get into something with something basic or fundamentally wrong
i mean to be honest like now it's not i probably can't add any value because of
technologies moved on and everything but at least i think i still have a good feeling there's
whether the cars basically right or there's there's some some issues that need attention
it's interesting to me that you're you know the the things that you've got involved in you know
pure rally cars that you understand from childhood enough but also gt racing big change for you and
then presumably off-road racing you don't seem to have um made a fuss about changing from one to
the other it are these disciplines pretty parallel or they or it can't be can they
um it's a good question i mean you know as i mentioned earlier when we got the call from
brian gusche about running a Bentley program as as as we mentioned i've never we'd never
he was the guy this is the Bentley guy that rang you up and said yeah let's have a chat Malcolm
yeah and uh of course you know i'd always been i i've always had this thing look we stick with
one product we stick with one discipline and and we we we do it properly and then of course you know
we we we lost in effect the the world championship contract from Ford uh we were still continuing
because we had still got some funding and we had some good backers at the time and then of course
this opportunity came along um but having said that we we didn't bring in any race people we didn't
go and recruit for race engineers i think we actually utilised
everybody that we had already on board wow and in literally a few weeks before we got the call
from brian gusche from Bentley christian laurel at the time a technical director he'd actually
came to my office and he said look um i think we should be getting into gt three gt three races
becoming really popular i think we said i said christian we're a rally company you know we're
we're not um but in fairness to christian um and then of course when i mentioned it to him
boy it was just it was his dream yeah you know because we passed on to chris williams sort of
doing the rally project so it was um it was and then of course christian laurel led the whole
bentley race project and then obviously son matthew then he looked after the the management
matthew your your son yeah who works in the business yes yeah so he looked after Bentley
so the all the operational side christian looked after the technical side and now of course matthew
is now heading up the whole Dakar logistics management side as well wow how good how good
was the Bentley first time out well we won silvers and i don't think was it was in our third race
wow and then we went three four weeks later to polo rickard and won polo rickard so within the
first how much to cheese people off a lot i think we got yeah that's really enjoyable
ah it's why it's winning it's just an amazing feeling in it and to be able to do that um
so early on in in our race career was you know okay the year before we we bought an Audi and we
did the british GT championship just again for us to get the experience a bit of an understanding
about the race inside um again you know we had some good support from the bentley technical people
and as i said christian really it was what he was looking to do was the next step for him
in his in his career as a technical director and then of course then when we did the gen two that
was a christian car which is just you know it still sort of sits right a place over there in the
because it and as i said just to win bathurst it's but you know we emolligated that car at
1260 kilos and the road cars what 2.2 tons or something it's yeah i was going to say that the
thing i've been to bathurst a lot in my youth and uh the thing you're aware of is just what
how difficult it is on the track like that to control mass so you know presumably what you
had to do is halve the weight well as you said yeah it's there's there's a you couldn't have a
example of a track where you write masses such a vital part of the of the package did you enjoy it
you went over yeah yeah i was like oh yes magical magical moment you drive the track yes yeah i did
drive the track as well it's just amazing it is i can't get over the there's a i can't remember
what it's called but there's a big fast corner at the top yeah where the car goes from full bump to
full droop to full bump again and it's cornering all the way yes yes add a new you know ridiculous
speed fantastic it's an amazing track yeah with public road yeah crazy you mentioned the feeling
of winning a second ago do you get as much pleasure from it running to places you did driving i had
to be honest i've had far more pleasure and satisfaction out of what i've done since i stopped
driving than anything that i ever did as a driver i mean don't get me wrong i lived my time you know
winning a few rallies in when i was driving but to win when you know what goes in to actually get
to that position to you know the thing that the guy started with a clean sheet of paper and that
the whole thing's been designed and developed and tested and then you've got the all the team running
the thing on the operational side on the events and everything you know you can imagine that to
build that team of people and the satisfaction it's presumably their happiness as well yeah it's
just great to see that you know and this might be a stupid question or one that's your car so but
when you when you first get the Bentley to have to make it into a racing car where do you where do
you start as you say it's two it's two tons and it's got to be nearly half that what do you
i mean that's obviously a question for my for the technical director but i mean at the end of the day
the big thing is is weight is weight c of g um your engine transmission package
definitely obviously the Bentley the gen two is is a totally different car to the gen one you know
the gen one when you look at it even it's it looks a bit like a modified road car whereas the gen two
is a purpose built you can see there's a big difference just by you know even if you walked
across there now and you can see that the gen two is a is a race car right from looking at it whereas
that the gen one was looked still the road car with a big splitter nearing on the front so
and but of course it's what we learned with the gen one you know we we couldn't have done the
gen two should we say without learning from the from the gen one do you feel do you i was about
to say do you think they'd give it another go but i suppose their preoccupation now is launching a
fifth model which is a pure battery car what do you do you feel concerned about the
the future of motorsport because so many elect they're going to be so many electric cars on the
road or i mean this this pertains to your f i a activities which we can get on to in a minute
i think Bentley would still still like to be in it but i think at the moment there's you know
there's it's not easy i don't think for a lot of the motor manufacturers with the changing
landscape from you know if you look three months ago scorder we're going to stop making the Fabia
in 2026 yeah now they're producing it out to 2030 yeah so it's it's a change in landscape in it as
well so so the commitment is difficult i i think because of because everything's still
i think it's still so unstable yeah that presumably makes life hard for you yeah but then
if you look what's happening with the LMDH and having what is it 12 13 manufacturers now for
the morn and there's there's more coming and i mean it's just could you imagine yourself in that
lot we would we would love to be back involved in racing yes yeah we are having some discussions at
the minute but it is something it's definitely something that that Matthew my son would definitely
like to get his hands back on again he really enjoyed that time running the bit you know being
with Bentley it really is a it gets a lot of attention doesn't it and people seem keen on it
the manufacturers yeah that's what i say i mean there's 12 or 13 manufacturers and there's we know
there's interest from others as well so yeah but it's strange it's a bit like Dakar every it's
it's one event everybody just talks about them on yeah and it's about you know the cross country
nobody talks about the other events it's all just Dakar yeah but that's it that does seem to be a
growth area doesn't it Dakar you know you're to be able to run as many cars as you're going to run
now and yet contemplate more of them that that's that bodes well doesn't it it's growing and it's
i mean it's very strong i mean even in Portugal last week there was i think there was 36 of the
36 or 38 of the top category cars which and you know they're not they're not cheap vehicles no you
know they're all between 600,000 and a million million pound each so it just shows you the strength
of and it's bespoke engineering isn't it it's not it's not as if you get hold of a standard car
change it or anything no it's all they're all bespoke and you know you've got a lot more freedom
than you have in any of the other FIA disciplines you know that if you think about the rally regs and
the GT3 regs and everything you've got a lot more freedom and scope in cross country than you have
with any other FIA discipline i slightly regret that there isn't a formalized coverage you know
visual video coverage that i mean i'm sure there's loads of stuff on youtube and all that but
i wish there was an organized curated program across country that yeah that we're where the
the disciplines were explained i think maybe it's an opportunity for the future it's good
it's a good point yeah because of course we're too close to it you just take it for granted and
yeah but tell us about your connection with the FIA you you are deputy president yeah
deputy president for sport and you were invited to do that in the middle of last year am i right
um no it was that i was invited it was this year this year sorry beg your pardon yeah
i can't it was probably around april maytime yeah something like that
um the thing that well i suppose let me tell you why i'm so interested in this we were talking
about it on the way me and matt because they're you know there are some quite high profile people
who stepped out you know more or less the same time because they'd lost faith let's say in the
in the way the organization was being run and you are a man of high credibility and you
went the other way why is that what can it do for you and what are you going to change
um another good question
i i didn't really get a lot of choice because i've got a long
standing not a long association with mohammed binson named the president
okay so basically you know we we won i can't remember seven middle east championships with him
when he was driving so he was very good driver wouldn't he so he was a good driver in his own
right yeah me you know he even had some good results even at world championship level but
obviously middle east nobody could touch him so we had a tremendous success running him as a as a
driver but of course i knew him as a as a driver and as a as a customer yeah shouldn't we say so
and we'd always stayed in touch in fairness you know he would every christmas day he always rang
and wish you a happy christmas and and then of course he he got the role of the the president and
um to be honest what happened we we got together this year on on dakar rally and
quite quite probably spent more time together because there was you know i was in a different
role i wasn't driving so i had time to spend with him sure and obviously we obviously discussed a
lot of topics as you can imagine rally uh what would i be doing what you know and then we obviously
crossed country and then of course we also had a social dinner and of course got on to a lot of
history and things that happened in the past and i think it was basically a combination of
that those conversations that we had this year on on on saudi yeah then made him think that
there was a problem in your role for me within within the fia do you you must be aware though
that you're i mean he's a bit under pressure from we're just i'm just looking from outside but but
he looks like a man under pressure he's a reelection coming and all that and what you've done is to
lend him credibility because you have very high standing around the world in motorsport don't you
you do well thank you for that i don't know whether everybody thinks that but thank you i'll
take it um yeah but i have to say um you know because of the the relationship i had i mean i
never ever you know i also had a lot of confidence in him and then of course he mentioned this role
to me and in all and see i will tell you it's the last thing in the world that i had ever thought
about he never ever did i think that i would do anything along the lines of a role like this sure
and he can be quite persuasive and i don't worry it's not a problem yet you you don't you want
me to worry you don't need to do a lot there's not much involved okay okay and then i would then he
would get ronan morgan his old co-driver on to me still come on you need to do these because i'd
said look no i can't it's this is not for me i don't i don't have the time i said put you know at
this point in time i haven't got my business where i want it to be to be i've put things in place with
but it's a bit too early for me to take on any other work so then of course he would get other
people to try and arm twisters arm twisters come on you'll be fine he you know he needs you he wants
you to do that all and so um he he just around one day he said right look there's a pressure
lease going out at half past three today with your name he said stop please you cannot cannot do this
yeah he said well no it'll be it'll be okay i said no please honestly i because i hadn't
mentioned it to anybody only my wife Elaine and then Matthew and i thought i just you know i need
to speak with you know michaelus brookett ford and let these people you know what i'm what's
what's going on see rings me back later i said don't worry i've delayed it until 9 30 tomorrow
morning so the rest of that day you're the one that you know ringing the various people so
it does i mean it is a responsibility isn't it is there anything in your head that you would
like to see change or change yourself there's a lot of things i mean you know i think i think
everybody knows that the minute rally i believe rally is not where it it should be i think the
word rally at the moment for me is actually going off the map but it's um i just think it's a sleeping
giant it's got so much potential still i believe so the competition's not good enough you feel
we don't have the volume of the manufacturers that we need uh the amount the amount of teams
yeah that we need we we need to bring the cost down of the of the cars etc and but the most
important thing at the moment is which is sad thankfully now we've got the process started
the current wrc promoter is now on the market and that's been my main priority since i i took
on the role to be honest um so hopefully we will having if everything goes to plan we should have
a new promoter in place for next season for wrc and so there's a lot of work going on with that
at the moment we'll be obviously be looking at and you of all people will know what it takes to
attract a manufacturer or some manufacturers yeah and i'm looking at trying to find ways to you
know to get the likes of scorer who are doing rally too and citron as an example trying to get
them on board as soon as possible because obviously if we've got a new promoter as well we need to
make it as as good as that for them as possible as well as a good platform to build on from from
day one is this sorry no i was going to say there was a time early 2000s i think when the
when the hope was that wrc could be a top five global sports and i don't know if it ever was
quite an effort what's the where could it be well it's still currently second to formula one i think
um in four wheels sports um i think we have to be realistic it's it'll be great but i it's like
you know it can never really be formula one but um it can certainly be a lot a lot better than
what it is and i think um i think if we get everything right with the new promoter and
they're prepared to invest as well then i think we can take it a big step away from where it
where it currently is and that's that's my target i don't know what what we can achieve but um that
is definitely what we'll be getting my attention to try and put it back on the map that's kind of
the number one that's my job for you priority yeah you know it in as you said before it encompasses
everything there's been a bit of rally cross stuff i was a formulary in London etc but
the you know and i think you know Muhammad comes from a from the rally side he's it's in his DNA but
of course he's very much occupied with the formula one side of it so um and it's the rally side is
it's definitely the the bit that i know have you have you sort of found yourself in a debate with
Robert Reed or David Richards or any other no no at the end of the day no i mean in fairness
Robert not just wish me he you know he found us to Robert he's he messaged wish me good luck and
so no there's been no and it's all gone as as you would expect so far i think the one thing that
i wasn't it's definitely a lot lot more work than than i was led to believe you say i think when
Elaine gets my wife gets hold of some of these guys that bring me up and say
Ronan etc it's don't worry to you know it's nothing it'll be fine so yeah this
as i said it really came too early and it's not something i was thinking about but
there's no question there's parts of it that i'm you know i really am
joining and i think as long as i feel i can make a difference then well
it is what you get for all these years of success though isn't it you know you
because because there's a limited a very limited number of people with who've got the cred and you
you know start to say something and get listened to yeah i mean i think you know i think there's
some really good people at the fia and to be honest i have to say i touched on it before you
know Muhammad was my it was a i knew him as a driver as a customer and i have to say for me
what he's done since he went there in terms of addressing the house getting the house sorted
out he's done an incredible job you know the two three years before he took over he lost was it
27 million or something like that and you know turned it around into a nearly five million profit
last year so from that point of view he's done an incredible incredible job and the way that he
controls the meetings now i have you know i had respect for him before but the respect just
gone to another level and you know i think it's it's good that he's he's going again and i put it
this way whenever he does step down i know that the fia will be in good shape yeah very interesting
very good shape you know financially it'll be in a it'll be in a great shape for the for the many
many years to come and as you think it's been going for 125 years it and if it carried on like it was
prior to him then it would have been a different story and from what i can see from what i've been
involved in and you are looking you're talking from the inside after all yeah yeah tell us what
your what's your life like these days i mean you you you still drive every you know and every new
car but you don't you're not as hands-on as you were but here we are in dove and bebe 250 miles
north of where the rest of us live um what what how do you keep all the balls in the air because
you're you you are a you know you've businessman lots of business contacts suppliers on the other
side of the country and so forth what what what's life like are you are you here most of the time
or what do you do if if i'm not away at an event or whatever then yes i'm here you know if i mean
if i'm in home at home should you say in residence then i will be here yeah it's
it's as simple as that it's a might be a an interference for a lot of people but i'm
i'm here and a lot of people try oh god he's here again you know yeah oh dear well we were driving
along the i think perhaps i'm wrong about the geography but there's a kind of valley that as
you drive into um lovely country other side of the road as you drive into a cockamouth and we were
by the bass lake along by the lake that's it that's it and i was on about um sort of dimly
remembering your story that you know that you were you set out to be a rally driver you were
successful they offered you you went to work in the south for a while no i didn't actually i didn't
actually go so back to have we got time for this yeah absolutely um no back to 1996
was around the time when i think ford were looking to outsource the the world rally program
um so we'd had as as of then it was malcolm wilson motorsport and we'd had quite a lot of
success with uh with national sales ford national sales program so example mohammed
in slain was one of them in the middle east uh myself british championship portuguese championship
italian championship with jolly clove etc so we we had we'd won like something like 11 so you
built the cars and they went to these customers we built the customer cars i see and these teams
run them or we run them as as an example we run mohammed we had involvement with the italians but
some of the other teams run them with their own operations um so i think they were looking to
outsource the the program from borough and then of course i was invited and uh you know it was
felt that we could do the job um but then of course um some of the
msini management in ford felt that it wasn't the right location uh well i suppose when they
sat down there thinking well how can you run a rally team from that part of the world cumbria
so um they just turned us in no that's sorry but it's it's not going to happen fine great
get on well i was you know having good success and we had a good customer base with you know what we
were doing and then i think it was around april or may time uh then i was approached again would i
consider going to essex and running the running the program from the current their current facility
at borough borough airfield which of course i'd spent many many days there done a few laps many
travel trips there and back in the same day and um so of course you know because i'd retired from
driving by then as well so um you can imagine it was just wow i just so much want to you know
run the rally team so basically i would agree everything i'd agree the terms uh and i was
going to go and do it and then oh it's probably one of the only things in my life that i've ever
backed out of but one sunday night i was just sat with my wife and we just i don't mean that great
support you'd have you know supported me to do it and then i just thought i can't do it and then
of course i'm thinking but how can i tell tell them the next day you know because it's just not
something i've ever done backed out of something and the the the reason for backing out is because
you just love this area so much is that it yeah i mean a big thing you know because again when i was
driving people always said to me that you know the journey's snapping from down south look mark
you need to move down south you need to be down here you can't you're in the wrong location to
no i'm i'm staying i'm staying in cumbria you know there so yeah it's always been and that was the
obviously the time away from home and so i just thought and i thought well that's and i had to
but it was a real difficult you can imagine because i thought well that is it there's no
chance of anything else um that is it you will have your business what you've got and that'll be
that that'll that'll be that whether you know but anyhow i decided no so i rang and told them i said
look i'm really really sorry but i can't do it right that was it thought right get on and then
we went to the world rally championship in finland with two private drivers
yamakaitoleto and harry rovan perre carly rovan perre's father in 1996 with two cars that we'd
built at my house and and of course ford were there with carlos science and bruno tiere
and we went there and finished on the podium finished third overall and carlos was six and
bruno tiere was eight so um not long after that then september time and basically got the knock
on the door and said could we could we talk again um and then of course yeah took a few months and
of course i just i just never thought it would happen because there was so so many sort of
doubters that it couldn't be done from this part of the world and especially over the water you
think you know the dearborn lot yeah and you know so i didn't actually believe it until i actually
had the press lease in my pocket that was going out the next day and i got the press lease we did
i did a rally forum somewhere down near somewhere down near heathrow on the building to the rsc
rally literally the week before and uh i just got the press lease and martin holmes turned up at this
rally forum and um he actually we got onto the subject again about what is ford going to do
it's such a mess the rally team etc etc what what what what are they going to do and i just
if you could see if you could see what's in my pocket
um so and then of course it was announced the next day and but none of my staff knew and everything
because obviously we'd had the disappointment earlier on in the year and then there was a talk
of me going so i thought until i absolutely know that it's happening so then uh must have been a
day in the works though so i because i came back from that forum in london next day and
i arranged with idland to get all the staff into the house and of course they had genuinely
i had 18 staff at that point in time they had no idea they honestly thought that i was gonna be
some of them thought i was closing the business down or and then uh so yeah that is one of the
great days isn't it it was a great day and uh yeah because the staff had no idea that was uh
managed to just keep it up presumably immediate problem build up build you know new facilities
new people well i mean then from then on you can imagine that was that led to dovenby presumably
yeah that was november 18 employees and then we went to montecarlo and listen a lot of people
weather crews they were but we went to montecarlo with 106 people really amazing so you know we
we like any business we had a you know we had a lot of groin pains but we had so much going on as
well and because i knew i was looking for a new facility uh as well already i was looking for
somewhere else from other than home even before i got the fall contract but then of course once
we got that contract it was just how long did that last how long did the ford works the proper the
you know full support from 96 until the end of uh was it 12 or 13 okay long time yeah so yeah
so here we are sitting in dovenby right next door is a is an amazing test track that you built
tell us about that what it's what how you use it what it's for do you get involved in road car
development and so forth these days um so how did that come about i mean yeah i mean that was a
where did i i i got the uh the the vision of that when i from when i went to um ferrari marine marinello
yep yeah marinello or fiorano probably the test track over the road yeah um
i just because i at that point in time alex cesare fiorio's son oh yeah was driving for
ford and of course we were on the Monte Carlo wrecking we went back to to stay with his parents
and of course the next day got the chance to go around in a 40 and i i just thought wow incredible
straight out onto the track and yeah so i got the idea then but never ever thought that we'd
be able to and then of course i mentioned it to my the guy who's done all the building work
and said what do you think we could ever because we've got the room here we have 115 acres or within
a ring fence and uh i said are you crazy you think we'll ever get you know chance to get a
test track on i said yeah but we we've we've got to give it a go um so in fairness it it took five
years to get the planning um it was it was quite a difficult period yeah i bet but uh having said
that i mean now we've got it's an incredible asset to have you know where you how do you use it now
well first of all we for m sport point of view obviously it's just an incredible asset to be
take a car straight out of the workshop so all our shakedowns for instance are done on site
oh really okay it doesn't justify the investments of the test track but it's a big deal but it's a
you can imagine you can't imagine the time it saves you know we used to have an airfield don't
get me wrong but it was an hour away and then you'd get there something would go wrong you'd
have to send somebody back there'd be people away out off-site you know the time lost now when
obviously with the cost of labour i think it's it's great you don't need to send half a dozen
people over there if you're doing a shakedown it's you know so it's it's an incredible asset
for us the time that it saves us um and of course if you're doing any durability stuff running in
transmissions it's just you know you can do everything without going off-site before you go
to an event so you know when you go to an event you get in the car and it's it's ready to go
but of course it wasn't just built for that my my vision was to to try and attract manufacturers
to come and do their their off-site testing and because again because of what we've created with
the the showroom facility etc was I was thinking about car launches things like that so as an
example we had BYD I came to that to that event they took the whole place over for the week to
do the launch of the sale and of course we've had manufacturers here with cars in disguise to do
you know testing and that is the type of client that I would like to try and you know that's the
sort of business that I really had in mind when with the vision and everything for doing it but
having said that as I say it's just become an incredible asset for us as as m-sport even
so do you got different surfaces and stuff like that out there um yeah there's a well on the steady
state there's two different grip levels on the steady state just basically there's 18 different
permutations the way you can use it it's 2.7 kilometers in its longest form the main straight
is about 800 meters long 14 data collection points so yeah and it's built to industry standard
was designed by Apex circuit design so wow yeah oh well we are very much looking forward to coming
up here and we're hoping that we can attract you to have a go in a few road cars I'm really looking
forward to it I just hope I'm here and I will definitely take you up on the offer well the
thing is it's always interesting for us to get outside opinions to the for these cars can they
tend to be well the terms of reference are there they're they're the cars we enjoy driving the most
in a year I think aren't they they tend to be new launches yeah new cars this year plus last year's
winner and of course you're bringing me up the sheer on to try as well yeah well we've put the
call in and we'll see how we get we'll see how we get no problem Matthew will be here too right
yeah you like road cars uh yes yeah yeah I mean yeah no I um I'm a I'm a big ranger over fun to be
honest I don't know how many about it's about 28 I think really yeah I just yeah but no I mean
what about Elaine does he yeah Elaine's got a Aston Martin DBX 707
I have to say that is that for me is the best car I've ever had we've ever had
I think it's just an amazing car yeah well it's pretty it's pretty optimal isn't it yeah
yeah great well um I guess we should let you have some time back bring this into land shall we yeah
but uh but thanks so much it's we're really looking forward to see I'm not exactly sure
when it is but next week or two isn't it we're we're going to meet here uh yes late October
yeah last week of October I think so well I'm looking looking forward to having you and looking
forward to driving some of these nice cars round yeah it'll be good to have you yeah
Malcolm Wilson thanks very much for your time no thank you look forward to seeing you in a couple
of weeks time thank you thank you for joining us for this bonus podcast brought to you in
association with Anderson EV makers of top quality home electric car chargers every one of which
carries a seven-year warranty as you'll find if you visit Anderson-ev.com for more details
Steve and I will be back on Wednesday with our regular my week in cars podcast see you then
you
About this episode
Malcolm Wilson, founder of M-Sport and former rally driver, shares insights on his journey in motorsport, from rally championships to GT racing with Bentley. He discusses the challenges faced during the pandemic, including layoffs and the impact of Brexit on business. Wilson highlights the evolution of M-Sport, including the establishment of their Polish operation and the development of the new Dakar vehicle. He also touches on his recent appointment as deputy president for sport at the FIA, aiming to revitalize rallying and attract more manufacturers to the sport.
Original notes
In this week's Autocar Meets, Steve Cropley and Matt Prior meet Malcolm Wilson OBE, former rally driver, founder of leading motorsport engineering company M-Sport, and Deputy President for Sport at the FIA.
Based in Cumbria, M-Sport has a rich heritage engineering Ford's World Rally Championship competitors, the Bathurst 12h winning Bentley Continental GT3, special Fords, BTCC engines, and much more besides. Join us as we talk about all of this and more.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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