Autoblog UK

The motorsport great John Surtees has become the first person to drive a sports car through the channel tunnel during a charity stunt. The drive was one of the events celebrating the 15th anniversary of the tunnel's opening.

The 1964 Formula 1 winner, who is still the only person to have claimed world records on both 2 and 4 wheels, drove an electric powered Ginetta G50 EV through the 31-mile tunnel.

He didn't break any speed records this time though as he had to stick to the 50km/h speed limit.

What didn't help with keeping a good time was also his constant stopping to have a closer look at the tunnel, which he called "a tremendous engineering feat".

"You certainly wouldn't want to be subject to any claustrophobic feelings down there.The tunnel is very small in parts," added the 75-year-old after eventually resurfacing in Coquelles, France.

An Audi TTS will race in the legendary Pikes Peak Race, without a driver at the helm. That's the ambitious aim of a team of students from Stanford. First efforts on a salt lake have proved successful with the car reaching 210 km/h (135mph). Shelley, the autonomous Audi, gets its name from the best-known and most successful rally ace, Michelle Mouton, who was the first woman to win the Pikes Peak race.

Early next year, Shelley will cover the course with driver, so that software can be programmed with live data. The race proper takes place on 27th June 2010. It won't be easy, as the famous rally circuit snakes its way 20 kilometres up a mountain around 156 turns.

Mattias Ekström reigns supreme. In the final of the Race of Champions tournament at the Bird's Nest Stadium in Beijing, the Swedish DTM driver defeated seven-time F1 world champion Michael Schumacher 2-0. After finishing behind him in 2007, Schumacher lost for the second time in the final against Ekström. The 31-year-old Swede had his first win in 2006 at the Stade de France in Paris and then won again the following year at London's Wembley Stadium. In the semi-final scrap between the two German drivers, Schumacher came home ahead of Sebastian Vettel, with whom he had clinched the Nations Cup on the previous day. In the second semi-final, Ekström defeated reigning Formula One World Champion Jenson Button.

Sebastien Loeb sped to a muddy victory on the Rally of Great Britain on Sunday to claim his sixth successive World Rally Championship. Not bad but is it healthy?

The Citroen driver's 54th career WRC win further extended his record-breaking achievements in the sport and once again left fans and pundits alike wondering what his rivals need to do to beat him. For some time there has been criticism that Loeb has turned WRC into nothing more than a showcase for his talents as Michael Schumacher did with F1 - and fans have consequently turned off.

Fortunately, as evident by his comments after winnning in Wales, Loeb faced a serious threat in the shape of Ford driver Mikko Hirvonen, who only missed out on his first WRC title by a single point. The Finn is a serious contender gave Loeb a real run for his money but his challenge only really materialised once another of his countrymen, Marcus Gronholm, retired in 2007.

As Mikko Hirvonen lines up for the first stage of the Rally of Great Britain this morning motivated by the prospect of a first World Rally Championship title, he may also draw inspiration from the remarkable efforts of one of his compatriots, Pentti Airikkala.

One of the original and these days mythical, 'Flying Finns', Airikkala claimed his one and only WRC win on this event in 1989, beating the likes of Carlos Sainz, Juha Kankkunen and Ari Vatanen as well as Malcolm Wilson, the current boss of the Ford M-Sport team that runs Hirvonen and his team-mate, Jari-Matti Latvala.

Airikkala's death from cancer just weeks before the event has robbed the sport of a figure regarded by many as from the same mould as Colin McRae, Henri Toivonen and Roger Clark - drivers who you could guarantee would give their all in spite of the odds. He gained huge popularity amongst British fans in the 1970s and '80s, never more so than when he was at the wheel of a Vauxhall Chevette - the car he drove to the 1979 British Rally Championship title.

These days, Latvala is probably the closest to Airikkala in terms of style, which perhaps is understandable as the Ford driver was a pupil at Airikkala's Left-Foot Braking rally school in Berkshire. However, if Hirvonen plays his cards right this weekend he could become the seventh Finn to win the WRC and in doing so, deny France's Sebastien Loeb a sixth successive world title. If ever he needed extra motivation, then perhaps the memory of his countryman 20 years ago in an unfancied Mitsubishi Galant will do the trick.



* The Rally of Great Britain runs from 23-25 October. See WRC website for full coverage

Abarth's new rally car is coming out soon. The 500 R3T is set to make its debut at the 51st Rally di Sanremo. This latest Abarth is powered by a 180bhp 1.4L turbocharged petrol engine with a sequential six-speed gearbox. We are told it will weigh in at just 1.080 kilos, i.e. the minimum permissible in the R3T class. The rally version of the Abarth 500 will be competing next year in this category for turbocharged vehicles with a capacity of up to 1.6 litres.

The bubble of hysteria surrounding the comeback of ex-champion Michael Schumacher has burst. The record title holder has had to abandon his planned return to the Formula One circus for health reasons. Because of an injury to his neck sustained in a serious motorbike accident last February, the F1 veteran is not fit enough to face the physical challenge posed by the GP race in Valencia on 23rd August. "I've done absolutely everything I can to prepare myself for this temporary return, but I regret to say that it just hasn't worked out," wrote Schumacher on his website.

So his successors in the top flight of motor racing will not be getting the opportunity to measure themselves against the legendary figure. And Formula One itself will now miss out on bumper business with the withdrawal of this major attraction. Manager Weber had been planning a new series of fan articles and the race venues were hoping for massive spectator turnout.

The legend of the Silver Arrows was born on 3rd June 1934 when the W 25 made its racing debut at the Nürburgring after having its paintwork stripped off overnight to reveal the aluminium bodywork underneath. 75 years later, the W 25 returned to the birthplace of the Silver Arrow mystique to celebrate its own jubilee along with four other Mercedes-Benz racing cars. Shortly before the start of the German Grand Prix at the Nürburgring, Pedro de la Rosa (W 25), Bernd Schneider (W 125), David Coulthard (MP4-13), Alexander Wurz (W 145) and Niki Lauda (W 196) drove one lap around the GP circuit in the Eifel forest. On the Thursday leading up to the GP weekend, Vodafone McLaren Mercedes Pilot Lewis Hamilton had already driven a W 25 all the way around the famous Nordschleife (North Loop).

Although they were naturally nerve-wracking for everyone at Team Peugeot, the final three hours of the 2009 Le Mans Hours passed off with a hitch for the French squad, and the two frontrunning Peugeot 908s went on to collect an emphatic one-two finish. The winning machine (N°9, Gené/Wurz/Brabham) finished seven laps clear of the best-placed non-Peugeot runner at the flag (Audi N°1), with the N°8 sister car (Sarrazin/Montagny/Bourdais) following it across the line to claim second spot. The N°7 car (Minassian/Lamy/Klien) completed the distance in sixth spot despite a spate of problems in the early hours of the morning.

As every year, the end of the race was marked by a number of accidents, and the N°5 Porsche's off prompted the safety car to be sent out one last time at 1.46pm. The N°7 and N°9 Peugeots profited from the neutralisation to pit for fuel. The safety car peeled off at 2.20pm and the three Peugeots made one last stop before the chequered flag. Sébastien Bourdais slowed on purpose to enable the three Peugeot 908 HDi FAPs to cross the line in formation. One-Two-Victory for Peugeot!



Eleven starts, eleven times in succession on the winner's podium: Audi continued its impressive series of podium results in the 24 Hours of Le Mans. After taking three consecutive victories Audi had to settle for third position on this occasion in probably the world's toughest endurance race.

"Obviously we are a little disappointed about the result", said Dr. Wolfgang Ullrich. "Peugeot produced a fantastic performance and certainly deserved the victory. We will analyze the problems we had to ensure we come back stronger next year." The race to Le Mans 2010 has just begun.

If there's a more raw and evocative sound than the roar of Chevrolet Corvette C6.R gunning around Le Mans, then it's been well hidden.

The LMP classes have the whoosh of the diesels, the highly-tuned scream of the Aston Martins but it's only in GT1 where there is noise like the Corvettes. And the sad thing is we won't hear or see them again over the 24 Hours with the GT1 class disappearing after 2009.

Their swansong at Le Mans looks likely to end with a flourish though and by the time you read this, they may well have won class honours again. Admittedly, without the Prodrive Aston Martin Racing team on hand to keep them honest, the brute force of the American cars has been without peers in the class and a podium clean sweep has looked more than likely for much of the race.