Photo: @atworldphotography

That sunny Artic Rally Finland podium is already days behind us and normality is restored again back home with my family. This past weekend at the second WRC event of the year I was pushed to the limit and to be completely honest it felt pretty damn great.

Photo: Markus Nousiainen

Nothing I do could ever compare to what the Worlds best rally drivers do but I have been a circuit racer for many years and I recognise many of the same emotions.

First of all the excitement before a stage gets underway. Standing at a stage end, knowing the first car is about to approach never fails to get my adrenaline pumping and I go fully in the zone of the job I am about to do. Usually I sit in my car and spend the time leading up to the first car by watching all live, looking at the previous stage times and preparing my book. In my book I write down times, overall standings, the road order, the split positions, tyres and the time they set on the first run if I am on the second run.

My book after SS3 Mustalampi

I had a moment in Finland now at the end of SS2 which was driven in the dark. About a minute before Ogier arrived at the stage end I found myself smiling under my face mask. I took a moment just to think about how incredibly lucky I am to be to doing this.

Then there's the pressure. I put huge amounts of pressure on myself to do a perfect job. Preparation is key as well as the focus of trying to both hear the times through the radio or as they get written on the board. More importantly I need to assess quickly what's right in front of me. What does the car look like? Is there damage that hasn't been noticed during the stage? And what is the drivers body language? Even though they get their time through on the radio after the flying finish as well as the co-driver recording the stage time they all look intensely at the board to see how their performance compares to the others. Usually there is a new reaction after that as well. We see it quite often that a driver thinks he has had good stage and is then very surprised when he looks at the board.

Photo: Ville Hantunen

Then through out it all there's the thrill and adrenaline.

Don't make small talk with me at a stage end. Chances are you won't get a response.

Don't make small talk with me at a stage end. Chances are you won't get a response.
If there is phone signal I will watch the stage on All Live before the first car gets to the stop line. After that I put my phone away and focus on the information I get over the radio in the minutes I have between each car. As you know there is also a slight delay on the live broadcast. Being in this zone of intense concentration is one of the many reasons why I love this job. It was the best part of racing a car too. All senses are alive and your sole focus is to deliver and do your job at the highest level possible.

Then comes the satisfaction OR the dissatisfaction. The immediate analysis of what went wrong, what could have been better. Previously the bad has massively outweighed the good and I would carry mistakes with me for a long time. Now I assess, learn from it and move on. We all make mistakes.

That feeling together with good colleagues at the end of a live broadcast

Arctic Rally Finland was to be my biggest challenge as a stage end reporter to date. I was to cover every stage including shakedown. This would in theory be possible because of no spectators and the way the itinerary looked, but still a tough challenge. I knew Saturday would be extreme, and I wasn't wrong. Friday and Sunday was fine because there were only two runs through the same stage. Saturday however, was two loops of three different stages.

Getting from A to B is one thing, and usually I have some time to prepare. This time it was a race against the clock and I found myself running from the stage end to the car and heading straight to the next stage, only to arrive minutes before the first car arrived at the next stage end.

This time it was a race against the clock and I found myself running from the stage end to the car and heading straight to the next stage, only to arrive minutes before the first car arrived at the next stage end.

This meant relying even more on having good radio communication with base to get as much info as possible from the stage. I also had WRC+ audio on in the car to listen to the stage analysis from the studio. Honestly, I hate not being able to write things down in my book before the stage but looking back it was good for me to get that experience too. If I have little or no info at a stage end I just rely on what I can see. There is always a story to tell by just looking at the car and the especially the driver.

And trust me, the pressure got to me a few times. I made some mistakes that probably none of you really noticed but I was fuming at myself. To be able to move on I had to reset my mind and just forget about it. At certain points of the day on Saturday I could really feel my head throbbing. A snow rally doesn't always have the biggest stories to tell. Everyone is one the same tyre. Of course they might have taken one or two spares and tyre management plays a big role like we saw now in Finland but there are not the big tyre stories like we have at gravel and tarmac rallies. When drivers make mistakes or spin they are likely to be saved by a snow bank or in some cases stuck in a snow bank, but usually drivers are lucky and get to the stage end. So it was an added challenge to vary the questions especially with them talking to me at every stage.

I learnt a lot this past weekend. I felt the highest highs but also a few lows and kept it all under control. Hope you enjoyed the show and like me you are probably also feeling that it is a looooong time until the next rally. Thanks for reading. Any feedback is greatly appreciated! :) All the best, Molly