MG Metro 6R4 - Inside Story of the Group B Rally Legend

No era in World Rallying has ever been more popular than the years of Group B in the mid-1980s. The regulations – introduced in 1982 – only required two hundred identical cars of a particular model to be built and this led to purpose-designed cars being created just for rallying. At the same time, a technology race began between the manufacturing companies, which led to exotic and high-performance cars that attracted flocks of spectators to the special stages of the World.

As early as 1981, Austin Rover had its first talks with Williams Grand Prix Engineering to persuade them to design a rally car with visual reference to the tiny Metro road car. It was quickly decided that this would have four-wheel-drive and a rear-mounted, naturally aspired V6 engine. They did not follow the mainstream turbocharged route and yet in many respects the Metro 6R4 was ahead of its time. In its first WRC event – the RAC Rally of November 1985 – the car with its wings and iconic Computervision livery immediately became a favourite with the fans, and, in some places on the rally route, their numbers brought things to a standstill. At the finish, third place overall with a new car – the final production cars were coming down the line as late as October – was thus considered a major achievement.

This book describes the project from inside. Mainly written from his contemporary notes by the former AR Motorsport engineer, Wynne Mitchell, and with additional texts by AR Motorsport Director, John Davenport, it tells the story from the first thoughts until the end of its WRC career in late 1986 when Group B was banned. From its pages, you will learn which hurdles had to be overcome and period notes reveal how tricky the work was developing the revolutionary four-wheel-drive system.

With close to four hundred large-format pages and 443 images, it is a deserved tribute to the car and to the people involved. The book is rounded off by stories about private teams who ran 6R4s, the life after 1986, and contributions from key personnel – like Williams’s engineers, Patrick Head and Brian O’Rourke, and from some of the professional 6R4 drivers like Didier Auriol, Malcolm Wilson and Jimmy McRae.