Vintage WRC Cars (1) Scalextric

＜Peugeot 307 WRC＞

As someone who has been an open-air motoring enthusiast for more than a quarter century, I have long been devoted to Mercedes SLs. Yet from time to time, I found myself strangely drawn toward the Peugeot 307 CC.

To be honest, it could just as easily have been a 206, 207, 307, or 308 ― that part hardly mattered. I simply liked the idea of a casual French convertible instead of another heavy, serious German Mercedes.

In the end, however, I never actually switched to Peugeot ownership. It was not that I disliked them. The same applies to Porsche, Bentley, or Jaguar as well ― none of them ever seemed capable of surpassing the reliability, practicality, and overall convenience of the Mercedes SL.

After the hugely successful 206 WRC, Peugeot chose the coupe-convertible 307 CC as the basis for its WRC challenger starting in 2004. But after struggling through two difficult seasons, Peugeot withdrew from the WRC at the end of 2005.

If success or failure is judged purely by results, then yes, the project probably failed. But that was not entirely the fault of the car itself. The Citroën Xsara combined with Michelin tires was simply too dominant during that period.

Still, the 307 WRC attracted attention for one major reason: since the Fiat Abarth 124 Rally of the 1970s, it was the first WRC car based on an open-top road car.

As someone who occasionally considered buying a 307 CC road car myself, I naturally followed Peugeot’s WRC activities with interest. Peugeot made an ambitious challenge and failed to achieve lasting success. Yet those kinds of challenges are often the ones people remember most clearly.

Speaking of ambitious challenges, Scalextric also seems to have a long tradition of occasionally experimenting with front-wheel-drive cars, failing to achieve overwhelming success, and eventually retreating from the idea. And apparently I have a habit of following those same paths myself.

Long ago there was the C76 Mini, and later ― though even that is already twenty years ago now ― this C2560A Peugeot. I believe it was released around 2004–05, and unlike the old C76, whose lack of suitable tires made it nearly hopeless in Japan at the time, this Peugeot looked like something that could actually be made to work properly.

So, as part of my ongoing “lighten the burdens of my heart before I die” campaign, I finally transformed it into a truly race-ready car in 2026.

Over the twenty years since I first entered the slot car hobby, I have accumulated at least some understanding of how to make non-magnet FWD slot cars drive properly, and much of that knowledge also proved useful for four-wheel-drive cars.

The original rubber drive belt had lost its elasticity and stretched badly after roughly twenty years in storage, so I replaced it with an industrial pulley belt of similar diameter. The tension is now slightly stronger than ideal, but cars from this era of Scalextric fortunately used metal axle bushings both front and rear, so durability should not be an issue.

That design also makes axle removal and maintenance very easy, which I consider one of the great strengths of Scalextric cars from this period.

＜Škoda Fabia WRC＞

I believe this one was released around 2004.

The real first-generation Fabia ― the 6Y series ― debuted in 1999. In practice, it felt very much like “Škoda equals Czech Volkswagen,” but while the narrow front face and chunky body proportions looked neat enough, the styling somehow appeared more awkward and less refined than the contemporary Volkswagen Polo Mk3 (6N). Well, perhaps that is simply the sort of face Czech people prefer.

Looking at similar hatchback slot cars from the same era, Scalextric had the BMW Mini Cooper, SCX offered the Lancia Delta Integrale, and I think FLY also made the Alfa Romeo 147 GTA.

The unpopular Fabia was frequently handed out as a race prize at various tracks. The first one I obtained was actually a prize for winning a race at Ebisu RPE.

At the time, my honest reaction was, “I don’t want an ugly car like this.”

But once I actually drove it, I discovered that it felt more stable than the BMW Mini, with handling that was genuinely quite good. In fact, it was probably one of the better-balanced cars of its kind.

Precisely because I knew how capable it was, it always felt unfortunate that nobody around me ever suggested things like, “Let’s race Scalextric belt-drive 4WD cars.” The format never became popular at all.

For me, the main attraction of the Fabia was its large five-spoke plastic wheels. I had always planned to reuse them someday on a TeamSlot ST185 Celica Safari build.

But after thinking about it more carefully, I realized TeamSlot axles were over 2.4 mm in diameter ― similar to Ninco ― so the wheels could not simply be swapped over directly. Enlarging the axle holes in plastic wheels while keeping everything perfectly centered is not easy, yet machining away the rims and using them merely as inserts for aluminum wheels would lose the appeal of their original oversized design.

In the end, the Fabia was not even particularly useful as a donor car, and before long it faded completely from my memory.

The reason I suddenly found myself searching auction sites for one again in 2026 was simple: after completing the Peugeot 307 WRC, I needed another car with similar specifications to run alongside it.

While searching for mid-2000s Scalextric rally cars online, I noticed that sellers almost never photographed the small “4WD” icon printed on the box, and rarely mentioned it in the descriptions either. Since it is nearly impossible to distinguish the four-wheel-drive cars from the two-wheel-drive versions based on appearance alone, the safest solution was simply to search for the Fabia I still remembered clearly.

Unlike the inexperienced version of myself who first entered the hobby twenty years ago, the present-day me has become far more skilled at things like ride-height setup and tire preparation. Because the Fabia already had fundamentally good handling characteristics to begin with, I felt confident I could finally turn it into an excellent runner.