RAC Rally of the Tests 2025 | Preview
The One They All Want to Win!
Over the last week or so, the UK has finally succumbed to the autumn, the leaves have begun to fall helplessly from the trees, and the temperature has started to drop, which can only really mean one thing; The RAC Rally of the Tests is round the corner! In just a few day’s time ‘Tests 25’ will begin. Three days of rallying, plus an evening prologue, that will include night sections, forestry, kart circuits and hill climbs, all spread across 37 tests and 22 regularities. This isn’t your average regularity rally, it’s relentless and demands unfaltering concentration from anyone who wants to do well.
76 crews will take on the challenge this year, including 12 taking part in the Lite Event, a slightly easier ‘Tests’ experience, but still a challenge with 35 tests and 17 regularities to master. The international entry, with competitors from all corners of the Kingdom as well as across Europe, and as far afield as the US, shows the breadth of the appeal of The Rally of the Tests. This year is the 23rd running of the rally and boasts the greatest number of tests ever planned on the event, pushing the drivers harder than ever and with plenty of tough regularities to tackle too, some over an hour in length, not to mention in the dark, the navigators will be put under scrutiny as well.
This year, the rally will begin in Kendal, not far from the finish of last year’s event, with a route that travels south through the Pennines and then Staffordshire, before pushing west into Wales and the final destination of Llandudno, a town synonymous with rallying. Back in control of the maps this year is HERO-ERA Competition Director Guy Woodcock, and he has planned a route that will visit plenty of traditional venues, and some new ones, though I have been sworn to secrecy over the location of these. “There’s a bit of everything, everywhere” he tells me, “Road sections, off-road sections and private land, the regularities tend to feature a mix of all of these.”
“I don’t want to give too much away about the new venues, but I’m excited to visit them and they should offer a great challenge. Plus, we’ve some old favourites, like Warcop, where we have ten tests planned.”
As always, Guy is most effusive about the night sections, and see’s these as key for anyone wanting to do well. “Saturday night will be massive”, he tells me, “Five regularities in the dark in Derbyshire, one of them is over an hour long with a great many timing points in it, it will be a lot of fun but could easily be a tipping point for the results.”
Anyone with an eye on victory then will need to have their wits about them in the Derbyshire dark, but a quick glance at the entry reveals that success on the road will only be half of the story, with some incredibly competitive classes. Class 1 is perhaps one of the toughest going, with three Mini crews in particular all capable of going well including Paul Crosby and Ali Proctor, who finished second overall in 2024. They will have to get the better of Andy Lane and Iain Tullie and Chris and Claire Day, with Chris showing just how quickly he can pedal a Mini on the recent HERO Challenge 3 event.
Class 3 also provides plenty of inter-class competition and may well prove to be the battle of the Cortina’s, with Kurt Vanderspinnen and Bjorn Vanoverschelde and Angus McQueen and Mike Cochrane competing in the famous cars, as well as Paul Dyas and Martin Taylor, who finished third last year and will have ambitions of going up a couple of steps on the podium. Recent HRCR winner John King is also in that class in his Lotus Elan with Matt Vokes navigating, and you can never count out former HERO Cup winner Jayne Wignall and experienced navigator Kevin Savage out on the Tests.
The fierce competition doesn’t end there, with Class 4 also featuring plenty of experienced crews, such as Rikki Proffit and Graham Wild, Callum Guy and Amy Henchoz, Mark Lillington and Mark Bramall and Paul O’Kane and Henry Carr, not to mention Thomas Koerner and Udo Schauss, who possessed tremendous speed on the tests during the recent Classic Marathon. Of late, Class 2 has been the one to avoid, such has been the dominance of Dan Willan and Niall Frost in Dan’s Volvo PV544 in recent years. Last year’s champions are absent this time around though, opening up the Class, not to mention the competition as a whole, and perhaps offering an opportunity for an outside name to feature on the overall podium. Dan’s Volvo will be entered, crewed by Steve Head and Oli Waldock, and whilst the car certainly has pedigree, they will have to fight off a whole host of other Volvo’s, including Martin Payton and Miles Fieldhouse, the 2025 Bob Rutherford Scholarship winner, as we will see an intriguing battle between the two young navigators.
Those two young guns, as well as all of the other navigators will be just as much under pressure as the drivers, with advanced navigation and map work involved and accurate instructions vital, especially in the dark. Whilst there is a lot of bias towards the driver, being a predominantly tests based event (the clue is in the name), both of the crew will need to be on it for the duration to do well.
Undergoing a little, but not much less, scrutiny will be those crews entered into the Lite Category. They will still have plenty to do, but with less of the night-based action. Last year’s winners were Dick and Harry Baines, and they return this year looking for another trophy to add to the cabinet but will face stiff competition from the likes of Steve and Julia Robertson and David and Debbie Bundy, not to mention the fact that their diminutive Mini will be facing off against a slew of more powerful machinery.
There will no doubt be errors across the course of the weekend, from all comers, and despite the predictions of Mr. Woodcock that the lynchpin of the competition could be the Saturday evening, there is every chance that the result won’t be in the bag until the crews have completed the final tests around the famous Great Orm, in sight of Llandudno Pier.
With the most tests ever on ‘Tests,’ the 23rd running of this incredible rally has the potential to push the crews harder than ever before, and with such fierce competition within the classes as well, 2025 is shaping up to be a bit of a classic. Revered and renowned, the one that they all want to win, this is the RAC Rally of the Tests, and I can’t wait to enjoy a front row seat as the competition takes place over the 6th to the 9th of November.