As soon as Subaru World Rally Team driver Chris Atkinson crosses a stage finish, he makes a call back to the service park. He'll discuss how the stage went, how the car feels and any changes he'd like to make in the next service halt. His engineer, Richard Thompson, is always on the other end of the phone. we caught up with Richard to find out what it's like to work with the team's youngest driver…
What does being an engineer actually involve?
The work starts way before we actually get to the rallies. Initially I write a build sheet detailing the specification of the car for the forthcoming rally. The rally team technicians and other departments, such as the engine and transmission workshops, follow this when they're building the car and sub assemblies. As an engineer you've got such a responsibility to the crew in terms of performance and safety and need to know the car inside-out, so throughout the build process I'll liaise with all departments to make sure everything is covered. Once the car is finished, we do a full systems check in the workshop, including zeroing all sensors, checking engine, shift and differential functions and a final check with the number one technician responsible for the car.
The final stage is to shake down the car at the Motor Industry Research Association's test track (MIRA) about one hour north of the factory. There we'll do a series of checks to ultimately sign off the car and any spare parts that we may need. This ensures that the car is fully ready for shakedown when it arrives at events.
You're obviously very busy before an event, but how does it work when you're actually there?
When I get to the rallies I inspect the stages with FX (Petter's engineer). We note road conditions, ground and air temperatures and record tyre choices. It depends on the rally and our priorities, but generally we like to recce all the stages at the time when they'll be run in the event so the measurements will be more accurate. After driving the stages we'll go back to service discuss conditions with our drivers and Terenzio Testoni, Pirelli's tyre engineer, and follow up the last minute work prior to shakedown.
Driving the actual stages sounds like fun. Do you drive them all?
Unfortunately not - I have to share the driving with FX. Not that we can go very fast though - we have to stop so many times to take photos of the surface and record temperatures. We've also promised Ken Rees, the team's event co-ordinator, that we won't to put a mark on the car so we drive extremely carefully! There are times when it is really nice to be out of the service area, for instance early morning at the start of El Condor stage in Argentina high in the mountains, or at the Col du Turini.
How closely do you work with Chris, both on and off event?
We speak almost every day, either over the phone or in person depending on where Chris is. This week he's been at a development test, which event engineers don't usually attend, so he phoned me after the first day to discuss the findings, what he's learnt and how we could incorporate them into the next pre-event test. He's very sharp and has got a good technical mind so he understands the changes we make and their effect. It helps that when he's in the UK, Chris stays very close to the factory and can come and speak with myself and all the departments directly if we're doing something specific. We spend a lot of time looking at in-car footage and data from the events plus comparing his performance to Petter to help us understand where he's faster or slower. Chris also goes to MIRA for shakedowns, which is a definite advantage as we can spend more time on the event talking about the stages and set-up and less time doing the basics such as changing seat belt lengths, steering wheel position etc. On events, there's actually very little time to talk to Chris, so anything we do before gives us more time.
How did you get started?
I come from a village south of Dalby forest in the north of England, which used to host rallies in the 70s and 80s and remember as a very young boy seeing cars pass our house and being serviced in the village. I thought it looked great! I started to work with local drivers and then did a typical four-year mechanics' apprenticeship when I left school. At the same time I was doing more and more events and then got a job as a rally technician with Nissan in 1991 when I was 21. I worked with Stig Blomqvist, Tommi Makinen and Francois Chatriot, but when the WRC program ended I started to work in 24 hour racing, the British Touring Car Championship and other national rally series run in the UK, Greece, Portugal, Holland and Japan. At the same time I went back to college and studied design for two years, which meant I was able to move from being a technician to an engineer. After nine years with Nissan I moved to Prodrive, but then had the opportunity to work with Nissan on their Paris-Dakar project. I lived in France for two years before returning to
Prodrive and the Subaru World Rally Team. I really enjoy it - it's less of a job, more of a lifestyle. It's a great team atmosphere here. A good team is all about the people.
Chris is a relatively inexperienced driver compared to Petter, does your experience help?
I think my experience is a bonus, it helps to have a better overview of priorities. There's no doubt that Chris is very fast, he is at a stage in his own career where you've just got to say edo your best and try not to crash', that's as much as you can hope for. At times he's been unlucky, but all top drivers including Colin McRae, Petter Solberg and Marcus Gronholm have made exactly the same mistakes at some point in their career. Sardinia Leg three was a classic example for Chris - he was driving really well, setting top four stage times, but got distracted and went off. Marcus made exactly the same mistake waving to someone in the crowd in Rally GB 2001. There's no shortcut for this experience, everyone has done it. It takes time to become a champion, but when everything clicks into place he'll be unstoppable.
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2006
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