November 18 was the twentieth anniversary of the signing of the agreement by Malcolm Wilson to run the official Ford World Rally Championship team.
Malcolm Wilson at Threlkeld Leys, December 3, 1996At that time Wilson’s company (Malcolm Wilson Motorsport) was based at Threlkeld Leys, a country estate south of the Cumbria town of Cockermouth, where the workshop was located alongside the Wilson family home.
The team drivers for 1997 were Carlos Sainz, who retained sponsorship from Repsol, and Armin Schwarz.
The only member of the old Ford team based at Boreham to work in Cumbria was the engineer David Hudson, and in the next eight weeks a new model Escort was designed, homologated and launched at Monte Carlo for the first event under the new World Rally Car rules.
The company name was immediately changed to M-Sport, followed by the move to Dovenby in the other side of Cockermouth followed.
- Martin Holmes
Malcolm Wilson Motorsport HQ, December 1996
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