In February 2009 when I bought my second car and my first Subaru. As a kid I always dreamed of owning a car like the ones in the rally’s.

Back it the day I was very young and didn’t know anything about cars. The car I started with was a 1987 Ford Escort XR3i. For the time I was proud of it, it had a big exhaust and I added some items along. Thinking of it, without realising it back then, I added a replica scoop from an Impreza.

Buying the Impreza

From the moment I started a weekend job I started to be more interested in the Subaru Impreza. One passed me always on my way to work and the rumble and blow-off valve always got me excited. So I wanted to know more. After a year of saving money I finally bought my car. It was an EU spec 1998 Impreza 555 Edition.

Slowly I started to get the feeling that something was missing. Now the car was just a rally tribute. I wanted to do something different, something no-one had and no-one could match … my contacts in rallysport grew and I started looking into the different rally’s Subaru was competing in. I learned a lot and by the end of 2011 I found the Safari Rally. I found it fascinating that they developed attributes for the car to compete a single rally. Then I learned why … it was the thoughest rally on the WRC calendar!

Searching parts

The haunt for the parts was on. It took me about 2-3 years to find them all, all of them are so rare but one more than the other of course … I started making the mirrors and bonnet piece myself as I didn’t think I would ever find them but I got very lucky. As a Richard Burns fan I wanted to replicate his winning Safari Rally 2000 car.

Of course I never really wanted to sell the car. After all, it’s my first real car and the project became a journey by itself.

While taking a step back for a little, I and started focussing on the Safari. It’s when I learned about the 1996 Safari. Subaru entered with Prodrive in the Group A class and I discovered they used most of the parts I alreay had. Great benefit of the Group A cars was that they ran 4 door cars. So this is when the story all makes sense.

Evolving project

In 2019 I finished most of the work on the initial Group A project. Ever since I try to focus on all the details to match perfection with the real car. The exterior is a 1 on 1 match with the car that rallied Kenya and I continue to work on the interior as well.