I know podcasts are a terribly modern thing, but trust me: This is really, really good.
Some may have noticed that this corona-thing has led to a greatly increased activity on the Internet: Where to go when you need to stay away from other people? Onto the Internet, of course. So these weeks we see a lot of energy and brainpower being used on how to move interpersonal contact over to something online. Some of the instruments and channels have been in use for a long time, but this is giving them their second wind: One such thing is podcasts.
Podcasts are a kind of recorded/time-shifted radio or some other “broadcast” or program, and I myself started listening to podcasts when I commuted just under 300 kilometers a day. The themed podcasts combined with a long commute gave me time to delve into topics – of my own choosing. That is opposed to live radio, where at the moment it’s nothing but virus anyway. In more than one sense. Not surprisingly, I discovered that there is also a difference in quality within podcasts. Even within the same “channel”, actually.
But some of the highest and most consistent quality, I’ve found from the known-from-Top Gear, Drivers Republic, Drive and Harris on Cars dipped-in-petrol-motoring-journalist Chris Harris: Repeatedly, he and co-host Edward Lovett have delivered excellent podcasts that really go behind the scenes and/or in real depth in matters of the automotive industry and motor journalism – the latter which to some extent shape the former or at least matter to the public attitude. And with typical British self-irony it borders on flagellant honesty and unreserved attitudes towards everything and everyone in the automobile world – either from the hosts themselves or from the guests.
The best podcast I’ve ever heard was in the past week, and it’s not least because of the guest, Nicky Grist: Most Britons will recognise the name, but for good measure, I’ll just sum up that Mr. Grist probably is best known for being Colin McRae’s codriver for several seasons during which they delivered some amazing drives, huge drama and bagged several victories as well.
Colin McRae doesn’t need an introduction, does he? He took the world rally championship in 1995 with Subaru, and aided by a (or rather, two) huge successes of car racing games for the Sony Playstation, he arguably became the world’s best known name in rally. Along the way, he also helped a whole car brand towards establishing a cool image, and it was not least this effect which Ford in 1999 bought in to with the world’s highest salary package for a rally driver ever – and then he and Grist would presumedly go on to become world champions in the new Ford Focus.
It just didn’t work out that way, and indeed this seems almost strange as Colin McRae was generally acknowledged as one of the world’s greatest talents behind a rally steering wheel in history. But the great art of this podcast is that Nicky Grist, who as a codriver naturally got to know McRae better than most, explains why this was. He does so in such a profoundly fine, honourable and thorough manner that you subsequently not only know much more about rallying in the nineties, but also almost feel that you know Colin McRae.
In the featured podcast, Chris Harris and Nicky Grist refer to an onboard video of Colin McRae being at his very, very best on the first special stage of Rally GB 2001. That’s what you can see in the above clip – which should be seen in full length, with sound, at rest and with an open mind.
And “thorough” should be taken quite literally: This is the longest podcast I’ve ever listened to, and in three hours and twenty-three minutes, we’re treated to all of Grist’s career codriving in rallying, and not least in great detail running through his turn with McRae, where the two were presumed to win the Rally World Cup for Ford. All of the preparation, all of the progress made, the crucial race and even a good part of the backlog. Delivered partly with a sober and factual angle – as one might expect from a rally codriver who reads notes – and partly with a human understanding that one would not perhaps believe was hidden beneath the driving suit. Three-and-a-half hours is a very long time, but I was absolutely captured. Fittingly I consumed most of it while sat behind the wheel on some long drives that I might in fact have invented for the occasion just so I could hear it to the end.
Presicely this podcast is quite simply the best I’ve ever heard, and I am not even that big into this era of rallying. But it was such a novelty to learn that even in todays cold world, you can get below the surface and taken deep, deep into the material by hugely knowledgeable people – if only you know where to look. This exact podcast gets my warmest recommendations, and you’ll find a direct link to it below:
Chris Harris talks Cars with Nicky Grist
And the other currently twenty episodes of the podcast series can be found on Harris’ and Lovett’s online sales platform CollectingCars. I have heard them all, and there is not a single one which I found the slightest bit boring. So go ahead and take some long drives while listening to these: It makes a lot of sense behind the wheel of a car. On more than one occasion I missed my exit. Really, it’s that good…