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ADAC Eifel Rallye Festival 2022 – 3, 2, 1 – and finally, Festival!

  • Full programme starting Thursday in and around Daun
  • Eifel Rallye Festival: Home of the historic rally scene
  • The rebirth of the 1975 Munari-Stratos

The countdown has started, and the tension is rising
After two cancellations due to CV-19, the anniversary edition of the ADAC Eifel Rallye Festival will finally take place from July 21st. At the same time, this tenth edition of the largest mobile rally museum will be celebrating the fiftieth anniversary of the World Rally Championship.
After shakedown at its new location in the Kelberger Land between Bodenbach and Borler on Thursday, July 21st from 15:00 to 19:00, the Welcome Evening will start from 20:30 onwards. The big stage on the Laurentius Platz in the middle of Daun will become an open-air rally cinema. Moving pictures from the history of rallying by cult rally filmmaker Helmut Deimel with still photos also framing the interviews.
During the technical inspection of the rally cars on Friday July 22nd from 08.00 in the Rally Mile at the centre of Daun, the fans can get close to the automotive witnesses of rally history. From 11:00, the top drivers from the Festival including World Champion Stig Blomqvist, Thierry Neuville, Harri Toivonen, Kalle Grundel, Harald Demuth, Jochi Kleint and Niki Schelle will be available for autograph hunters on the Laurentius Platz stage for one hour. Afterwards, Demerath is the new sporting centre for Friday afternoon and evening. The afternoon stage between Demerath and Steineberg starts at 14:33 and, with its surface being 38 percent gravel, will ensure spectacular driving scenes. In the opposite part of Demerath, the evening show with the second special stage will start at 19.48 hrs.
On Saturday, July 23rd, the participants and the fans can look forward to a new rally stage as, in addition to the classics 'Risselberg' and 'Lehwald', the route will go around the 'Hochkelberg' for the first time. All three stages will be completed in the morning and then repeated in the afternoon. As always, the Rally Mile in Daun will attract visitors during the extended lunch break when the rally cars are serviced, and their crews refreshed. There are hardly any better opportunities to get so close to these historic rally treasures and their drivers in this open paddock. It is a paradise for photographers and autograph hunters. The grand finale starts at 19:30 with the rally party around the stage on Laurentius Platz with live music.

Eifel Rallye Festival: Home of the historic rally scene
Even though the famous drivers are often in the foreground, the real stars of the Eifel Rallye Festival are the cars. Nowhere are there so many originals or faithful replicas of the automotive contemporary witnesses from rally history collected in one place. "At the jubilee of the fiftieth year of the World Rally Championship, we can thus show a unique cross-section of the history of this series," explains Reinhard Klein who, as the head of Slowly Sideways, the Europe-wide association of owners of historic rally cars, is responsible for putting together the starting field. This is limited to one hundred and fifty-five rally cars. "Slowly, the contemporary rally scene is becoming more aware of the tradition of this fascinating sport. With the Eifel Rallye Festival, we have created a home for this scene over the past ten years, which makes us really proud."
As always, there are minor changes to the starting list since often Corona illness makes them necessary. Sitting alongside Harri Toivonen (#1, Lancia Delta S4) will be Juha Paajanen, who not only used to sit in the 'hot seat' with him, but also with his brother Henri. Fred Walter (#62, Lancia Beta Coupe) will get a prominent co-driver for some stages as Simo Lampinen, who used to be a works driver for Saab, Lancia, Peugeot and Triumph, will navigate for him. The current list is always available on the website (www.eifel-rallye-festival.de). Another top star of the current WRC scene has announced his coming. As soon as the exact time is fixed, the fans will be informed via the organiser's social media.

The rally scene supports the flood victims in the Eifel
About a year ago, the flood disaster caused a lot of suffering in the Eifel region. The participants, fans and friends of the Eifel Rallye Festival showed an overwhelming willingness to donate in order to support the flood victims. "We were able to provide €50,000 in donations to the flood victims. This excellent response shows the affection of all our participants with the region in which we are able to celebrate our festival again this year", explains Otmar Anschütz, the chairman of the organising MSC Daun.
In connection with the flood, there were innumerable other supporting actions, one of which comes to an end for the time being at the Eifel Rally Festival. In the Ahr valley, a hall was flooded that contained a wonderful collection of vintage cars. A group around Volker Thull and Florian Treitz took the vehicles out of the hall and distributed them all over Germany. They were able to do this because, in response to a brief appeal, many people had come forward to help clean up the flood damage. One of the cars was also taken over by the MSC Daun. 15 of the cars could be saved and are now back in their pre-flood condition. The entire operation was accompanied by a TV team from SWR. In the presence of the SWR, three of the cars will now be handed back to their owners in exemplary condition on Thursday, July 21st at 19:00 before the start of the Welcome Evening on Laurentius Platz in Daun.

The rebirth of the 1975 Munari Stratos
Sandro Munari and his co-driver Lofty Drews came second in the 1975 Safari Rally after an eventful rally with their Lancia Stratos. The story is legendary that co-driver Drews, getting a lift from a private car, pulled up at the Lancia service and shouted for tyres. In a private car packed with three spare wheels and tyres, he made his way back to Munari, who had had to park the Stratos with only one complete tyre left. In 1976, their Stratos was used as a training car and had an accident. The Kenyan Sergio Lolli bought the crashed car, disassembled it and wanted to rebuild it. However, the parts were strewn around his garden and there is a legendary photo from 1990 when his dogs were using the Stratos cockpit as a kennel. In between, parts of the Stratos were stolen from the garden. Lolli was able to buy back some parts – including the irreplaceable carburettors – from the thieves. Lolli's son Ezio sorted everything out, collected all the parts and shipped them from Nairobi to a restorer in Italy. Now seventeen years later, the work is complete and the Stratos is back as it was on Safari in 1975. So here forty-seven years later at the Eifel Rallye Festival in Daun, it will celebrate its first major outing following its rebirth. Drews, who is now eighty years old, did not want to miss this opportunity and is travelling from his new home in Australia to Daun. There, he will take his seat next to Ezio Lolli in the Stratos with the starting number #140 at the Festival.

From 'Down Under' to Daun
The furthest journey to the Volcanic Eifel will be made by Australian Darryn Snooks, who will be driving a 1977 Datsun Violet 710 together with Tracey Dewhurst. in 2005 Snooks stumbled across a Datsun 710 SSS in excellent condition in New Zealand. And so began a long project to build a faithful copy of the original 710 SSS factory car. A worldwide search for parts meant the build took almost eight years before he also found one of the very rare twin-cam engines to complete the project perfectly. Darryn: "When we started building the car, we had a vague dream of maybe bringing it to Europe one day. Living and growing up in Australia and watching legends like Stig, Ari, Henri and Walter, it was a dream of mine to be there one day too." Now that 2019 is over, the 'Aussie' has once again shipped his Datsun in a container to take part in the Eifel Rallye Festival – so, welcome Tracey and Darryn!

Support from the far north
It has become a tradition that the Festival receives a lot of support. The 'ADAC Team Nord' around Jürgen von Schassen from Neustadt/Holstein are almost regular guests. Whereas at the beginning there were just over ten people coming to help run our event, this time the 'Nordlichter' are making the 680-kilometre journey to the Volcanic Eifel with twenty-five people. "We are bringing licensed and experienced team members with us to Daun to actively strengthen the Festival. The fun of it all has brought us together from a wide variety of ADAC clubs here in the north and we're doing all we can to support this unique event." It goes without saying that their experienced support is most welcome in Daun.

 

The Eifel Rallye Festival - Timetable

Thursday, 21.07.2022
15:00 - 19:00
Shakedown in Bodenbach

from 20:30
Welcome evening in the Rally Mile Open-air rally cinema with cult filmmaker Helmut Deimel

Friday, 22.07.2022
From 08:00 hrs
Vehicle scrutineering, Rally Mile in Daun

11:00 - 12:00
Autograph session with many VIPs and stars

from 14:30
Peugeot Super Stage with gravel sections between Demerath and Steineberg

from 19.30
proWIN spectator circuit Demerath-Winkel at night

Saturday, 23.07.2022
08:30 - 17:00 h
asphalt tests in the volcanic Eifel

In-between
Rally Mile in Daun with many attractions

from 19:30
Rally party with prizes and awards

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