160 BLUE IS THE COLOUR...

Now that R&R have their car for the journey, we need to think about a theme for them. Initially, they played around with the idea of buying a Ford Transit and making it look like the A-Team van, topped off with Richie in an inflatable dinosaur costume to represent Hannibal Smith's penchant for working as an extra in films, and Rachel dressed as B.A. Baracus (the idea of her crossing international borders in disguise as a black man didn't faze her).

Then Richie bought a black Ford Kuga, and we played around with the same theme for his chunky softroader. By this point, Rachel had given some thought to presenting her documents to immigration officials while masquerading as a person of a different gender and race from those listed on her passport. She decided it wasn't the best idea! Still, the theme was reasonable and doable.

But now R&R will be travelling in a blue car, which is chunky but doesn't quite have the same intimidating presence on the road to pull off the A-Team van look, so a new theme and name are needed.

I was talking with Rachel over New Year's about what we could do, and I mentioned we could do a variation on the Gulf Racing theme. Her car is more royal blue than baby blue, but I reckon if we made a load of orange stripes and stuck them all over the car, then we would have something that looks good if not perfect, which would fit with our 'we are having a go but don't really know what we are doing' ethos.

We can use the same process as we plan to use on the Abarths: cutting strips of magnetic material, spraying them with a rattle can, and then fitting them once we get to the start. This will result in a slightly shonky look across the three cars, which makes me happy. It also means that we can remove the look completely without damaging the paint once we have finished the rally.

I asked AI to create a quick mock-up to see what it would look like, and I'm impressed, to be honest! R&R can go mad, though. If they want to ape the look of famous Gulf Racing cars like the Le Mans Porsches or the GT Cup McLarens, then the world is their oyster. With a bit of arts and crafts, it can be done...in theory!

While brainstorming, Richie actually found a picture of a Q2 rally car. As long as the design isn't too mad, we should be able to replicate it. I love this part; it is exciting to see the ideas bouncing around.