You must buy this Ford Escort RS Cosworth recce car

Look at the size of those spotlights. LOOK AT THEM. You can absolutely guarantee that you’d never lose your way in this Escort RS Cosworth.

Super cool thing, isn’t it? As you well know, the Cossie was initially designed to homologate the Mk5 Escort for Ford to compete in Group A rallying, and this particular example has found itself sitting somewhere between road and competition spec. 

That’s because this was used as a recce car for rally stages – hence it being a left-hand drive, German-built model. The interior has been stripped out, mudguards added and the iconic whale tail spoiler removed. Mega.

Now, you might have noticed the names stitched into the Sparco seats. Rumour has it that this very car may have been used by the late, great Colin McRae. Let’s place emphasis on the 'may have' for now, because this hasn’t been officially confirmed. This car will go up for sale at the Classic Car Auctions March Sale, and the listing states that there is an “outside chance that it could have been used by Malcolm Wilson's works Ford Focus team in 1999”. That’s good enough for us to start getting excited at least.

The listing also notes that this very car was the subject of an insurance claim in 2004, and that it was subsequently inspected and VIC passed. Presumably there was a bit of ‘if in doubt, flat out’ going on at the time. 

There’s 37,700 miles on the clock, and your guess would be as good as ours to determine how much power the turbo’d 2.0-litre inline four is making.

The estimate? Between £23,000 and £26,000, with all bids being taken online or over the phone. Someone confiscate that mouse right now…

Images: Classic Car Auctions