VIDEO: Nürburgring Road-Legal Subaru Lap Record

A 400bhp, tuned but road-legal Subaru Impreza built by Revolution Motorsport in the UK has set a new lap record at the Nürburgring Nordschleife circuit, of 7m53.08s, on off-the-shelf Yokohama ADVAN rubber – beating Tommi Makinen's previous road-legal Subaru lap of 7:55, set in April 2010 (although it must be said that record in worse weather has stood for two years and was set in a bog-stock, 300bhp WRX STi Sedan, on much less sticky rubber, with 100+bhp less and standard brakes/suspension/aero (see that classic rally slag Green Hell lap here). Revolution's PR men say: "The concept behind the car was to set the fastest lap for a road-legal Subaru Impreza. While the car was highly modified, it was driven directly to the circuit, completed its record lap and was then driven back to the UK, all on the same tyres, fuel and brake pads. A handful of tools and spares travelled in the car but it was a genuine road-going car." The aero-kitted Subaru was modified with the 255/40x17 ADVAN A048R tyres, suspension, wheel and brake tuning and a stronger engine with Cosworth internal components, a Turbo Technics modified turbocharger and fuel additives. It knocked out 420bhp for the lap, despite being tuned to achieve 500bhp. The driver for this lap was Fredy Lienhard, proprietor of Nordschleife specialists Rent4Ring, with an estimated 20,000Km of experience under his belt. He set the new record on his first attempt in the car – despite the car's wanton desire to understeer. How he got it turned in on some bends is beyond me! Check out the full video with telemetry above. Revolution Motorsport's Glenn Campbell said: "We are very happy with the new record. We built the car to celebrate our 15th anniversary and did that in style. We have a very long-standing relationship with Yokohama and always use their products on extreme projects such as this one. We built the car from scratch specifically for this project and I am delighted that we were successful." Managing Director of Yokohama HPT Ltd, David Seward, said: "I would like to offer our congratulations to Glenn and the rest of the Revolution team for an amazing achievement. We have worked with Revolution for many years and in that time, have come to understand that when they say they are going to do something, they do it and I am delighted that Yokohama was able to be part of their success." Fair play to Revolution, who are a great bunch of car (especially Subaru!) enthusiasts and run a good company. And good driving Fredy! Anyone out there with a road-legal Subaru think they can better it?

VIDEO: Tommi Mäkinen Testing Subaru R4 Racing 2013

Ex-WRC God and four times champion, Tommi Mäkinen may have 'retired,' but we are chuffed to see he is still busy in rallying... these days testing, building and preparing Group N and R4 rally cars via his website. Just imagine how well they go with his expertise!  And if you wanted proof, or just to see a classic "Mak attack" in action again, here is the legend out testing in the Kees Burger TMR Subaru R4 Racing 2013 model, in the Finnish snow. Still got it Tommi! Love it!

VIDEO: A Classic Dogfight: Rally GB 1998

It's Rally GB this weekend folks! To get you in the mood, here's an absolute classic rally finish from 1998 – with some complete legends in action: Both McRae brothers in the best-spec 1998 Impreza WRC, Tommi Makinen & Richard Burns in the Mitsubishi Evo, Juha Kankkunen and Bruno Thiry in the last outing of the Escort WRC and Carlos Sainz and Didier Auriol in the Corolla WRC... with a cruel finish for them, after a massive fight on the wet, slippery, foggy, dark stages of Wales. Bloody perfect. Miss these days... don't you?