Lot details
Registration No: EJ02LKU
Chassis No: WF0BXXGCDBYG09461
Mot Expiry: Aug 2011

Car manufacturers frequently use motorsport to showcase their wares and few global producers are more practised at the art than Ford. The company's founder, Henry Ford I, cast the die with his famous racer 999 as far back as 1901 and the company continues to be victorious today - not least in the field of international rallying (WRC), for which Ford's current weapon of choice is the Focus.

Today's WRC formula is essentially a silhouette one - ie where the cars outwardly ape their road-going counterparts but radically different mechanicals are hidden below. For sure, the average Focus driver would get quite a shock if he were to take the controls of one of these turbocharged 300bhp, four-wheel drive monsters. Ford's own drivers have certainly been successful with them, however, winning many events outright over the last few years and taking the Manufacturers' crown in both 2006 and 2007. Since 1996 Ford's WRC entries have been built and run by M-Sport, a Carlisle-based concern established in 1979 by former Ford works driver Malcolm Wilson.

In order to publicise such successes the manufacturers and their sponsors frequently build recreations of the competition cars that they can display at shows and exhibitions. The left-hand drive vehicle on offer is one of these. We have few details to go on, but understand it is a 2002 2-litre Zetec-engined Ford Focus that was specifically reconfigured as a WRC Show Car for VK (Global Brands) by M-Sport - the M-Sport name features on the number plates. The exterior is fully liveried and comes complete with roof scoop and large rear wing, while the interior features a competition roll cage, Sparco bucket seats and Sabelt full harness seat belts. The vendor regards the coachwork and paintwork as "average" and the engine and transmission as "good". The Focus is taxed until the end of July 2011 and MOT'd into August.