Tanak: From underwater to the podium

Given its true meaning, the adjective 'shell-shocked' is reached for far too easily.

It would be laughable, for example, to consider using it in the middle of a motorsport event in South America.

Or so I thought. But when Ott Tanak emerged from his, err, discussion with M-Sport team principal Malcolm Wilson back in April, it was difficult to find a better description.

A couple of hours earlier, Ott had whipped a wheel off the Ford Fiesta RS WRC in the middle of a Rally Argentina river. A little way north and a month or so earlier, he'd dipped one of Wilson's cars into a Mexican lake. You might remember the moment...

Tanak was in danger of being remembered only for crashing his car into a reservoir © McKlein

Having helped develop more young drivers than pretty much any other team principal in rallying, MW is painfully aware of how many eggs have to be broken to make an omelette.

The list of who had sat in Tanak's seat (the one in front of Wilson, not the one behind the wheel) is pretty impressive and includes Markko Martin, Francois Duval, Jari-Matti Latvala and Mikko Hirvonen, to name but a few.

Not that any of that helps when you're staring down the business end of a Wilson-wielded hairdryer.

Wilson's frustration was immense. He'd been there before, having given Tanak a season-long chance in a World Rally Car in 2012, only to give him up as a bad lot at the end of the year. The Estonian's chance, it seemed, had come and gone.

Tanak wouldn't give up. And, in the same way that Andreas Mikkelsen had to reboot his career, Tanak went home and drove a Subaru in the Estonian Rally Cup.

Thanks to the belief of another Cumbrian, Dick Cormack, Tanak returned to the world championship with DMACK backing in 2014.

And he was a changed man.

Or so MW thought. Argentina was changing his mind.

Latvala is among so many young rally stars who received Wilson's support - and wrath © LAT

It was time for a word.

Tanak doesn't enjoy the most colourful of complexions, but he was white when he closed the door quietly behind him.

Crashing, it would appear, was no longer an option.

Some drivers would have taken that in and moved on, but talking to Tanak at the next round of the championship in Portugal, he wasn't one of those drivers.

"Malcolm gave me a chance again..." he said in a voice full of understanding and regret at having let the side down.

Wilson's not a tyrannical team principal, unwilling to accept anything but the best. But his patience and cash reserves were being sorely tested. Question was, would the stick succeed where the carrot had failed?

Fifth in Portugal and great times in Sardinia (where a broken gearbox casing spoiled a rally that was set to end in a podium) made for a positive outlook.

But Poland last week was when it all came good.

And came good in some style.

By some distance, Tanak was at his absolute best on the frighteningly fast roads on the Polish side of the Russian and Lithuania borders. He was immense.

Tanak was the only man close to the VWs in Poland © XPB

An apex view of a fifth-gear left-hander on the Saturday-morning Paprotki stage offered ample demonstration of Tanak's ability.

This road had been used the previous day, but in the opposite direction, the upshot of which was some ruts on the right hand side of the road.

Because of the speed of this section, the ruts weren't deep, but braking from 120mph to an apex speed that would still be measured in three figures, they were significant.


The Volkswagens thundered through on rails. Tanak's speed was absolutely the same, but the Fiesta fidgeted as it was fired towards the apex. From my side-on vantage point, I saw far more of Tanak's left hand than from the Polo drivers...

As a brief aside, Kris Meeke's Citroen hit the apex sideways and completely unsettled in a three-second window that spoke volumes about a car's ability to suspend each corner.

M-Sport will spend six days in Finland finetuning its Reigers before the Fiesta takes flight again on the next round. The suspension is the final piece of what's looking like an increasingly impressive 2015 jigsaw from the Cockermouth squad.

DMACK began Tanak's WRC redemption © McKlein

The Fiesta RS WRC is testament to some serious hard work from M-Sport. And nobody else. Too many people still refer to the Cumbrian outfit as the Ford team. It's not the case.

Make no mistake, M-Sport is on its own with this car. Granted, there's some help from the Blue Oval, but probably no more than private teams elsewhere in the sport would receive.

And that made Tanak's accidents all the more painful.

"I know," says Tanak, "how hard the team is working to stay in the championship."

Which only added to the emotion when Tanak landed third place, having brushed off Jari-Matti Latvala's last-gasp effort through the powerstage. The Finn crashed, but it was the Estonian with his head in his hands at the finish.

"Fucking hell," he says, eventually, having taken it all in. "This means so much."

As his eyes filled, his throat dried.

It was the same story back in the service park as a sound all-too-rarely heard these days broke out: the M-Sport roar. Wilson's contribution was shortlived as he listened to the gratitude and emotion in Tanak's voice.

"You know me," smiles Wilson soon after the moment, "I can get pretty emotional as well..."

Too much of this in 2012 led to Tanak being ditched by M-Sport © XPB

And then the car and the crew came back to a rapturous welcome. Tanak caught Wilson's eye and the pair knew they'd done it.

The team principal had unlocked the full potential of one of the sport's most tremendous, not to mention tenacious, talents, while the driver had showcased what M-Sport's latest creation is capable of.

"This is like a win," says Wilson. "OK, if we were a manufacturer, of course it would be different, but this is like a win for us.

"People don't really see or understand this team. From the outside, we maybe look like the other [manufacturer] teams, but it's a real fight for us."

Tanak wasted no time in singling Wilson out.

"He took me back," says Tanak, "when maybe others wouldn't have done."

With that, Wilson beckoned Tanak towards M-Sport's control centre. He wanted a word with him and Molder.

The pair grinned as they walked towards the darkened room. As well they might, there would be no hairdryer today.