Midnight Sun Rally Archives

2011 Midnight Sun Rally – Full tilt boogie

A few days ago, I brought you some video footage from the regularity class at the Midnight Sun Rally. That’s where most of the Saabs were featured.

Following is a video from the historic class, the flat-out version of the rally that doesn’t feature quite so many Saabs, but does feature a lot of action.

Enjoy your viewing.

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My apologies to a few of the Saab drivers that I missed. My camera was running so low on battery power towards the end that I was turning it off between cars. Sometimes it didn’t start up again quickly enough. There were at least two Saabs that I missed – a 99T and one or more 96’s.

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Going to the Midnight Sun Rally was a ton of fun. You’d need to be well organised to get to spectator points on a number of different stages, but once you’re there it really is like old-time racing.

People spill out and walk along the track in between cars. They’re gathered on the hills, some of them having picnics.

And then there’s the driving, which as you can see is pretty exciting stuff. Many of Sweden’s top drivers were there, including Kenneth Backlund from the Saab Performance Team, former Saab champ Stig Blomqvist as well as eventual winner, Kenny Bräck.

If you have an opportunity to get along to one of these historic rallies in the future, I recommend that you do. You’ll see some outstanding machinery, some ace driving and you’ll have a whole lot of fun doing it.

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2011 Midnight Sun Rally – Regularity Class

The 2011 Midnight Sun Rally ended just over a week ago and there were a lot of Saabs entered in the event. If you haven’t seen the Midnight Sun Rally photo album yet, then make sure you click on that link and check it out.

Most of the Saabs at the event competed in the Regularity Class. This is not full-tilt rally driving as you might know it. Regularity, as the name suggests, is all about driving to a regular schedule and being consistent in that. In the case of the Midnight Sun Rally, this meant driving to achieve an average of 50km/h over every stage of the event. Cars incur penalties for being outside the 50km/h average target.

This video shows most of the Saabs competing in Regularity this year. Because I was filming on some longer, straighter sections, this is more like a chance to see and appreciate the vehicles than to see some sideways action (that’s coming in another video a bit later!). Regularity is more about teamwork and precision than it is about flat out speed. It’s also less expensive than flat-out rallying, allowing greater access to a wider group of people.

Enjoy the cars! You’ll see a great range of Saabs here from the Saab 92 right through to late model Saab 99s (entries in the rally have to be at least 30 years old).

Saabs at the 2011 Midnight Sun Rally

I’ve got a swag of photos from the Midnight Sun Rally, held around Västerås last weekend. I don’t have any of the cars on the dirt, though. I only shot video there, which I’ll post very soon. These stills were taken at Rally HQ in Västerås, where the cars would assemble at the end of each day.

I’m not sure if I got everyone, but I got a lot of them! Here’s a selective collection of larger images, with a more complete gallery below. Click to enlarge.

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This blue 99Turbo is the latest car built by the Saabs United Historic Rally Team. It’s a replica of Stig Blomqvist’s 1981 car from the Swedish Rally.

Many of you heard that would-be Saab investor Vladimir Antonov was entered for the race, which would have been the second year in a row for him. This is the team he would have driven in.

The three cars were prepared by Historic Rally Racing Service in a record time of just three months. All three cars feature sports suspension but are running non-turbo, single-carb engines. There’s scope for more performance in them, but for this build (in this timeframe), reliability was the goal. Also, competing in regularity, reliability is more crucial than performance.

The insides of one the cars, complete with chequered flag trim 🙂

Mr Antonov’s place was taken by a friend, Alex Fogilev and the Saab Museum’s Peter Backstrom was drafted in as co-driver.

This Sonett II certainly looked (and sounded) the part. I’ve always wondered why there aren’t more of these in historic rallying, but I guess their relative rarity and fibreglass bodies might have something to do with it. Should still be good for regularity class, though.

Lasse and Sibylla have competed in the last four Midnight Sun rallies. They always compete in period costume. The regularity class is at relatively slow speeds and there is no requirement for racing suits or excessive safety modifications (which is why they can carry suitcases on the roofracks and dolls as passengers in the back seat!). This is the first Midnight Sun they haven’t finished, suffering with a broken driveshaft on the final day.

This early Saab 96 was one of the most immaculate racing vehicles I’ve ever seen. You could eat your dinner off any surface you looked at. Incredible.

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Below is a larger gallery, featuring all the photos above and a bunch more (a few non-Saabs, too. How often do you get to see not one, but two Lancia Stratos?)

Click to enlarge.

Coming soon we will have some video of the Saabs in regularity class, plus all the other vehicles (and a few Saabs too) in the full-tilt historic class.

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In the Inside Saab garage parking lot – Saab 9-4x

I just wanted to post a quick note on the new wheels in the parking lot tonight.

This is my chariot for the next few days……. click

It’s a Saab 9-4x Aero – 2.8T V6 with XWD – and I’ll be taking it up to Västerås tomorrow for a few days of action at the Midnight Sun rally.

I’ll be arriving in the afternoon and taking in all the final day’s action, checking out all the Saabs in play and of course, sharing plenty of photos and maybe some video here in Inside Saab.

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Mrs Swade and I took the 9-4x out for a nice leisurely drive this evening, taking one of the back roads out of Trollhattan towards Lilla Edet. It’s a winding, uneven surface and in the rain, there’s plenty of reason to be cautious (which I was). The 9-4x was totally planted, however, and didn’t miss a beat. It was an incredibly encouraging first run, even if just a short one.

The difference between Sport and Comfort modes is a marked one, as it should be. Comfort soaked up all the road’s uneven surfaces quite nicely and Sport turned it (surprisingly) aggressive. A real Jeckyl and Hyde, this one – in a good way. Those two modes should be different, otherwise why have them?

Can’t wait to get it out on the open road tomorrow. I’ve got my wife here, an iPod, a Saab 9-4x and 300+km of roads to travel. What more could you ask for?