On the eve of the start of the 2015 edition let's look back about 30 years, to 1984.
Two wheel drive was still seen as a competitive technical solution in the early 80s but only in tarmac and gravel/tarmac .
1984 was the final nail in that coffin.
While boxy Audis looked awful as they plowed on dry tarmac, the Monte was almost all snow that year so anything with two driven wheels had no chance, Audi swept the podium led by Walter Röhrl.
The first clip is in Italian, it essentially tells of Lancia's (and everyone else's) tale of woe in the face of the teutonic turbos. Still the Lancia 037, the Renault 5 and the Nissan 240 RS the Open Manta (and was that a Subaru Leone?) all look glorious fighting their way around the icy hairpins.
No wonder everyone is so excited about the new R-GT championship this year,
The second, in English is a condensed version focusing mostly on the Audi and Lancias
Bonus clips in French and German at the bottom
love the Lancia drift tandem in the second video - I know some rally/drift guys who are basically going to be recreating that!
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