Flying Scotsman Day 3

It's all ended in ignominy for car 28 - and it was going so well too.  Our clutch failed yesterday meaning that we tried to spend our time in third gear today. After a manoeuvring exercise at the Highland show ground we went onto Knockhill racing circuit where the car flew round like a Transit Van on steroids.  It may have been too much because after a couple of perfectly executed regularity tests through the Scottish countryside and a bit of drag racing through The grounds of Scone Palace, the wheels came off our rally run.  And I mean literally the wheels came off - one of our rear half shafts sheared and the wheel bent like a nasty broken bone. We were out of the race, and within sight of lunch too.

Three hours later we arrived at Gleneagles on a flatbed transporter courtesy of the RAC.  The finishing cars were being piped across the line but our photo was taken with us at the chequered flag on foot and carrying our bags.

Still the idea of the rally was to test us and the car and that we have done.  Now for some whisky.

Numbers

The Endurance Rally Association is a bit coy about how much it costs to enter the Rally - but its about £25,000 per person, so £50,000 per car.  Although it's a lot of money, it is a 35 day trip and the price includes all meals and accommodation, services of mechanics, petrol tankers following the convoy and all the rally route preparation. Taking this into account it didn't sound too bad.

Of course we also needed a car and Simon Ayris of Rally preparation Services had told us that we would need to spend £80-90,000 on a fully prepared Rally car. Many people do it for far less but they inevitably have more problems along the route.

Myself, Richard, Paul and Edmund held a council of war at the Royal Automobile Club in London's Pall Mall and concluded we needed to do more research before committing ourselves.