an evening with walter rohrl

[Dave Eaton <dave.eaton@minedu.govt.nz>]

folks,

after the advanced driving course with walter rohrl (see previous post), i had
the opportunity to have dinner with him with a few people on the boat (aka gin
palace) of my audi dealer.  a very pleasant evening touring auckland harbour
with about 10 people on the boat. it didn't take much encouragement for me to
start talking to walter about driving, audi's, rallying and life in general. 
he is an absolutely fabulous guy, courteous and articulate.  afterwards one of
the other german instructors said that he'd never seen walter talk so much, so
walter had probably enjoyed himself.  i certainly did - it was the highlight of
my motorsport experience.

walter's greatest race.

walter thought that the monte carlo in 1984 was his greatest race.  he had just
transferred to audi from opel after taking the drivers championship from audi
the previous year. he had apparently turned audi down in 1981, and they were
not particularly pleased.  walter described how he had had to change his
driving style.  holding an imaginary wheel between his finger and thumbs he
described his style in the rear wheel drive car as being very precise and
careful.  in the quattro his challenge was to make it turn in and he had a
great deal of trouble in adapting his style.  he described 3 accidents in
practice for the monte carlo, hitting a lamppost and others.  he was growing
exasperated and fearful that he wouldn't be able to handle it, when it all came
together just before the start...

when the time came for the off, he drove through the stage having used the
tyres which stiq (blomquist) had chosen (stiq being responsible for all tyre
testing). at the end of the stage, walter described the time coming through in
his headset that stiq was 30s faster!  walter "i could not believe this.  30
seconds!"  at the next stage walter drove flat out and heard in absolute
disbelief that stiq was 1:30 faster!  walter made his fingers into a pistol and
pointed them at his head to describe how he had felt. fortunately for walter he
had a friend who was watching the rally and he described to walter that he had
looked much more committed during the stage than the others.  he also told
walter that the others (stiq and hannu mikkola) had changed tyres just before
the start.  almost unbelievably, audi were denying walter the chance to compete
on equal tyres.  walter thought that this was in payback for 1981 and to deny
him the chance to look good immediately. 

naturally, walter "discussed" this with the team and was 1:40 up during the
next special stage! he felt that it was his best rally.

he described san remo in '85 as special because everything worked so well, and
the s1 won by so much.

on rally driving.

according to walter, absolute speed is all about motivation.  nowadays, his
motivation is what prevents him being as fast.  he (as the porsche gt1 tester)
has the opportunity to go back-to-back against the young guns and told us how
he was still quicker than them.  but not for too long he said.  the 2nd time,
he doesn't have the motivation.  this was especially true on the special stage.
 he still gave the impression of being very competitive.

on audi

"you know", walter said, "i have worked for porsche for 10 years.  in those
years porsche quality has gone from here to here", he said gesticulating with
his hands about 1 foot apart.  but audi never had moved so much, it was always
so good'.  he was positive about the 's' series audis, although agreed with me
that there had been no genuine replacement for the ur-quattro.  he talked about
travelling at 250km/hr in the s4 4-up which had impressed him.  he punted the
s8 around impressively setting the car up pretty much as he did with my
ur-quattro.

on the ur-quattro

"it is so chuckable, so stable.  fantastic turn-in made it so easy to setup for
the corners.  there is so little roll, even 4 up at speed. in 1984 4 of us were
driving through the alps and a ferrari wanted to play..."  walter shrugged and
smiled.  enough said.  

when i asked him if i could take a photo of him with my car, i saw the 'pr
mode' smile as we walked outside.  then he saw the car and he said "oh an ur" 
and his face lit up.  he sat in it and it "the engine is so strong, 400 or
450,000 kms no problems.  and the sound...  i had not seen one for a long time
when i went to  her meyer [aka mr mtm] who had made me a carbon fibre mountain
bike.  i went around and saw an ur in his garage.  i asked him if it was for
sale, and he said 'no, this if mine, and its not  for sale, it is my personal
car'."  "of course", walter smiled, "her meyer had 350 hp".

i asked him what he thought about that sort of power in an ur-quattro.  he said
that he preferred the  normal power "it is so balanced as it is", he said.

after taking my car around the circuit at full speed, he sat in it and said to
me "perhaps i should get my own one of these"

on the rally cars.

the decision to shorten the a3 to get the sport was taken mainly by hannu who
thought that it would give the quattro better turn in.  walter disagreed and
said that it simply made it more nervous.  he hated the sport and  said that
no-one could really drive it because it was so nervous.  it was reasonably
stable at speed in a straight line, but that was about it. 

the s1 was, according to walter, a considerable improvement.  it was much more
balanced and stable, and walter really liked it.  "it was getting good by the
end".  it was as good as the peugeot, and in a number of rally's, we were
simply unlucky with punctures etc".  the big advantage of the quattro was it's
stability at speed in a straight line, it horsepower and speed and its ability
to stay reasonably stable in the air.

the mid-engine quattro was real, and walter drove it.  it had a longitudinally
mounted motor, and was "quite well sorted".  it was canned because of the group
'b' withdrawal.  walter was disappointed. 

on the current group 'a' cars, walter is pretty scathing.  "they are too easy
to drive, not like the old days when you really had to drive".  walter related
a story where they would test all week changing springs, dampers, camber and
caster and gain about a second.  on the last day the tyre guy would turn up and
suggest that they test his new tyres.  "bang, 2.5 seconds just like that",
walter shrugged.  "these new cars are too easy, their traction is too good, so
they all finish with the same time".  the straight-line speeds are slower than
the group 'b' cars, but the cornering speeds much faster.  of the current
drivers,  he knows sainz and mccrae, but really likes both latti and burns.  he
hasn't seen much of makkinen.

on gt1

(walter has done most of the development work on the gt1). "porshce have big
problems", he said.  "the clk is so fast, especially in fast corners and down
the straight.  mb seem to have some mechanism for sucking it down at speed. 
it's downforce is exceptional. walter said that to rectify the problem would
cost porsche 50m dm (!) and was doubtful... 

on children.

"i never had children.  hannu had a child and bang, 1 second!  stiq 2.5
seconds!  just like that.  so for me, no children".  i got the impression that
while the competitive part of him didn't regret the decision for a  minute,
other parts of him did.

on the future.

he was leaving the next day for 3 weeks of mountain biking around the south
island with his wife.  when we explained that the southern alps were the same
size as the french and italian alps together, his eyes widened and he told us,
that he'd have to come back...

he will stay with the porsche development role, but his back was giving
problems so racing was out of the question.  travel more, buy an ur-quattro and
keep it. 

overall an exceptional evening with a great guy, and a real highlight.

dave
'95 rs2
'90 ur-q