Dream drives - vol 1 - 206 WRC at night in Monaco

Tightness. This is the first sensation that ignites your nerve endings. The Sparco bucket seats vice-like hold on your thighs and shoulders. The harness the compresses you back and down into the seats recesses. Strapped down tight and held bolt-upright by the seat, no stereo adjustments will be made from here. No bother, there's no stereo anyway. Just a plain grey panel blanketed in pilots switches. Your eyes dance from the neat labels from fuel pumps to the fire extinguisher systems and the all important starter switch.

As you raise the firm red switch cover and swiftly flick up the metallic switch the car begins it's awakening. One rotation, two rotation, three rotations, then it catches and all hell breaks loose. The engine fires with a blast of revs, quickly settling back to a noisy idle, vibrating the entire vehicle and the brain inside your skull. Despite the helmet you can hear all the engines mechanical workings, as you press the throttle your ears tingle with the vast rushing of huge volumes of air, passing into the turbocharger. As you lift the pedal you hear these same gasses being exhausted, the car rocking slightly as you lift your foot, as if the car is disappointed with your lack of commitment.

The sensation of noise and vibration is unlike any vehicle you've been in before. It feels as though there is a beast lurking around you. Sniffing and snorting, straining at the leash, as though held back by some higher power. Your vision is a daze as your eyes struggle to fight the vibration. Your ears full of buzzing from the solid mountings and thick metal roll cage bars. Intimidating for sure, this is not a vehicle for the faint-hearted, not one you want to disagree with, yet it dares you to try.

The only distraction from the sound and vibration is the brightness, despite the late hour, a halo of light surrounding you and the car. Monaco's brightest street lights shine down through the windscreen. Ahead, vertical beams of light disappear along the long dark straight between the high-rise buildings. There are no other vehicles on the road, no pedestrians and only few lights in the buildings above remain lit at this late hour. The streets are yours for the taking, Monaco has never been more still.

You dare to prod the throttle again, the noise echoes all around you. As the revs flare the noise reverberates from high-rise to high-rise, seemingly travelling down the street ahead of you. You tentatively pull back on the sequential gear stick to select first gear, a satisfying metallic clunk as the gear slots home. As you flex your right foot, all hell breaks loose. The car sets off quicker than your brain can comprehend, the grippy tarmac tyres and four wheel drive system working in perfect harmony to launch the car, pushing you back ever-further into that snug seat.

You pull back on the lever, the gearbox slamming home, second, third, fourth. As your confidence builds you push throttle further and further till the rubber stop puts an end to the pedals play. The car is ripping through the gears, you can barely grab them quickly enough, did they have an auto option? No time to think, roundabout ahead. You slowly release the throttle and unknowingly place your left foot over the left pedal, you are no rally driver but it feels natural in these circumstances.

The biting grab of the brakes still comes as a surprise. They grab instantaneously, locking the front wheels and launching the body forward on it's soft springs. You release the pressure on from your left foot slightly and the brakes release their vice-grip on the discs. Though the deceleration maintains its powerful force, pulling your head away from the seat. The speed plummets down and you forget all about the gears, the car threatening to stall before you slam the stick forward. Down the cogs, fourth, third and into second.

The steering is heavy and feel-some, the vibrations allow you to feel both the angle and travel of the front wheels almost telepathically. You feel intrinsically linked to the tyres, feeling every suface undulation and camber change. The car pivots around the centre point, hauling the front end towards the inside kerb, too quickly! Release some steering lock and bleed in the power. The car settles into a light four wheel drift, mystically pulling the car towards the roundabout but also pushing it around in a perfect arc.

You allow the wheel to pull straight as you max out the travel on that right pedal once again. The rear of the car squats and you bang through two gears along the short straight. This time though, the sound is different, less violent, you feel less encroached upon. You glance to your left and see the lack of high-rise buildings. Just a compact metal barrier between you and the shimmering dark water, it's perfect surface only broken by the gaggle of yachts in port ahead. The serenity doesn't last long though, as you once again are battered by a cacophony of noise. The tunnel you are blaring through feels familiar. No time for daydreaming, the road ahead bends right, seemingly tighter and tighter as you blast back into the brightly lit road and hit the brakes quick for the left-right chicane. Back down the 'box and fight the wheel and the rear threatens to come around on you.

The yachts from the distant view are suddenly within touching distance, towering above the barriers at the roadside. That's when it hits you, this isn't any road in Monaco. The tunnel, the chicane and the flowing left ahead, you're on the Formula 1 Monaco Grand Prix circuit. You relish the cars balance and poise, pivoting the car neatly through the flowing section of tight turns before finding yourself stationary at the finish line. There are no fans here today, no hustle of pit teams or excited commentary. The silence engulfs all as you stop the fuel pumps and snuff out the engines fire.

Not designed for the asphalt streets of Monaco, but the dirt roads in the hills above, the 206 nevertheless has made every nerve ending tingle, your hairs will stand on end for minutes afterwards. The attack on the senses hasn't diminished any since it's WRC victories over 15 years ago. You may not be Marcus Gronholm or Gilles Panizzi but the 206 masked the holes in your skills, saving you from those encroaching high-rises and intimidating metal barriers.

You don't want to leave that now comforting and warm seat. Never again will you pilot anything so vicious on the senses or feel a vehicle on such a knife edge, always halfway between complete control and complete anarchy. But the wheel ahead begins to fade as you open your eyes, that simple wheel and dash replaced by your bedside cabinet. The echoing turbo-four replaced by the buzzing of that infernal mobile. But for once you don't feel disgruntled. You've just taken possibly the worlds finest rally machine around the winding, infamous streets of the Monaco GP, well, in your dreams at least.