Shropshire Magazine

Louise Acton meets two Shropshire men who undertook an amazing journey in an even more amazing vehicle.

Not exactly an urban runabout … La France ‘Italia rep’ is four tonnes of brute force with a massive 15-litre engine

Malcolm Corrie and Oliver Holmes are adventurers of the old school. While they are both naturally enthusiastic people they are currently in a particularly exuberant mood because they have been able to reflect on completing the 100th anniversary rerun of the Peking-to-Paris motor car rally, a gruelling transglobal odyssey which had been a long-term ambition of Oliver.

The inspiration to join the extraordinary race came about as a result of a book about Prince Borghese that Oliver had read at prep school. This Italian aristocrat was the winner of the 1907 rally and thereby achieved international acclaim.

Malcolm - known universally as Maco - and Oliver completed their epic journey in a 1920s vehicle originally built in New York for the fire brigade, but this was no fire engine.

Oliver explains: “This old commercial vehicle, known as a La France, has a huge engine, makes a tremendous racket and is jolly good fun to drive.

“I then had the brainwave to restyle it to look like Prince Borghese’s winning rally car, which was an ‘Itala.’ We subsequently entered the 2007 race in the pioneer category, having renamed our vehicle La France ‘Itala rep’.”

This restyling resulted in La France becoming a five-metre, four-tonne, 15-litre monster of a vehicle.

Maco, explaining how he became involved, says: “I was 10 years old when I met Oliver through an orienteering trip climbing the Lawley. The first prize was a trip in an air balloon, which I won, and Oliver was the pilot.”Along with our wives and children, we’ve remained friends ever since. So when Oliver told me he’d made the decision to enter this madcap race, I flagged my interest in joining him.”

There were, as Maco goes on to explain later, other, far more personal reasons for his involvement.

They set off on May 26, along with 133 other competitors driving automobiles ranging from a 1959 Volkswagen Cabriolet to a 1923 Rolls-Royce Silver Ghost. The route was very close to, and untested since, the 1907 competition.

And they’re off! With just 12,214 kilometres to go, Oliver and Maco set off into the great unknown

All participants raced to strict rally rules, running against the clock every day. Maco and Oliver are quick to point out that even though mobile support was available from the rally organisers, 29 vehicles still failed to go the distance.Oliver and Maco, on the other hand, were fast to earn their spurs en route from Beijing to Mongolia.

Philip Young, the organiser, applauded the inspiration they gave to other drivers by “simply roaring away early every morning”. La France ‘Itala rep’ was doing well and they were ranked high up on the leader board, in line for a gold medal, before reaching Mongolia.

Bordered by Russia to the north and China to the south, Mongolia has a harsh terrain, and needs a gritty determination to handle its sandstorms and howling winds in an open-top vehicle.

Moreover, driving into its vast red desert, with no roads and misleading tracks, required strong navigational skills - which Oliver explained was Maco’s forte, while he focused on the wheel.

“We are both quite practical, but Oliver does like getting quite dirty and covered in oil - and so tended to be under the car,” says Maco.

“But one of the joys of an old vehicle is that they are fairly straightforward, albeit bigger and messier, and it’s easier to get to where the problem is.”

Nonetheless, the Gobi Desert was dubbed the ‘car breaker’. In fact, the rally organisers warned competitors that on reaching Mongolia, they would turn back vehicles unlikely to manage the 3,000km, eight-day journey to Russia. The pressure was on.

Raising dust near Ulaan Bataar

“We rather suspected the Gobi might shake a few things off, like the exhaust,” Oliver says, “but with four tonnes of car slamming on to its axles, as we drove across rough stony ground, the radiator also sprung a leak, as did one of the huge fuel tanks.”

This was later followed by a shattered front spring and a left drive sprocket falling apart, just three kilometres away from the final camping destination in Mongolia.

As a result, La France ‘Itala rep’ lost ground in the race, and was taken on a frustrating 15-hour lorry journey into Siberia to make a date with a welding expert.

Later on, and back in the race, they found the roads in Siberia and Russia were even worse than the conditions in the Gobi Desert. Maco recalls: “We were all praying to be back in Mongolia, because these roads really were dire.”

Siberia was also a “bit dull”, Oliver says, with his typical understatement. They covered thousands of kilometres with few major hitches, averaging 60 miles an hour, for days on end.

“It was nothing short of phenomenal for a 90-year-old vehicle,” he adds.

Having negotiated their way out of Russia, the next challenge arose in Lithuania, on a four-day national holiday.

Oliver recalls: “We were on a race track doing a speed trial when the main driveshaft sheared. Although it might have been possible to weld, it would have undoubtedly broken again.

“As we were trying to work out what to do, a local chap offered help. At 6.30am, the following morning, my phone rang and he said a new half shaft had been made in nine hours - quite the engineering feat!”

Fortunately, the last days of the journey were less eventful. Maco and Oliver were able to enjoy the smooth roads of Western Europe as they headed towards Paris and a reunion with their families.

The end of a long, hard and at times very rocky, road: Place Vendome, Paris

As Maco points out, by the time they reached Place Vendome on June 30, they had been away for some six weeks.

Of course, Maco had left behind his wife, Camilla, in charge of managing the family estate at Leighton, while also looking after four children, all under the age of nine.

Likewise, Oliver had left behind his wife, Hilary, and three grown-up daughters. Professionally, he was also away from the family business, Merrythought Toys Ltd, which is based at Ironbridge.

Chivalrously, both pointed out the huge challenge faced by Camilla as the floods hit the vicinity of Leighton when they were away, while Oliver claims, no doubt with a large slice of irony, that Hilary was relieved to have him “out of the house!”.

However, this adventure does have a serious side to it. The main objective was to raise money to support medical research funded by a charity called Ataxia UK.

Three of Maco’s wife’s young nephews and nieces have recently been diagnosed with Friedreich’s Ataxia, a rare genetic disorder mainly affecting the nervous system.

Symptoms usually appear in mid childhood, most sufferers become immobile by their late teens, and many die in early adulthood. But, as Maco points out, vital funding for research may help to halt the disease’s devastating progress.

Dubbed by the rally’s participants, ‘driving the impossible’, it was always going to be a challenge for Maco and Oliver to get from A to B in their chosen vehicle.

However, this amiable and well matched pair rose to the challenge and worked hard to raise funds for their charitable cause.

As a result, they received significant private and corporate support, including funding from some of Shropshire’s most respected firms. To date, they have raised approaching £10,000 for Ataxia UK.

When asked for their recommendations to others, who have ambitions to complete a similar challenge, they reply together: “Buy our car!”

• To make a donation to support research into Friedreich’s Ataxia, go to www.justgiving.com/car14peking-paris