In the latest episode of Tomi’s sheet music series, Minna Sillankorva was the guest, who won the 1991 World Informal Championship in Women’s Rally.
The fastest female driver of her era Minna Sillankorva recalls Tom ‘s notes in the new episode of the podcast, turning points in his career. Sillankorva was successful not only in Finland but also abroad, winning the unofficial World Championships for Women in 1991. Of the car brands, Mazda was close to Sillankorva. First down was the rear-wheel drive RX-7, which later switched to the Group A four-wheel drive 323.
However, his career began, in the spirit of the times, with a Ford Escort. That car later ended up as the future four-time world champion Tommi Mäkinen for the first rally car.
– Tommi came from Jyväskylä to see that car and eventually left Hämeenlinna to drive back to Jyväskylä after the shops.
Today, a fluent man was still a shy young man at the time.
– It’s true that Tommi was a really shy guy. However, I remember when the blocks around our transport company were all gravel, then Tommi quite quickly pulled the test drive in it, although not much else was said but necessary, Sillankorva recalls the historical moment.
The 1991 season that ended in Minna Sillankorva’s world championship is memorable. As a map reader, he was an Italian Michela Marangoniwhich had previously operated e.g. Miki Biasonin as an ex-wife’s map reader.
– We are also united by Michela that we are the same age. We were born in the same year, in the same month, and on exactly the same day.
Rounding out the World Series races was also a tough project financially. However, Sillankorva received help from the Astra team, which is familiar to Finns, and which organized a significant number of sponsors.
– We had a few of our own sponsors, but after Monte Carlo, when we started driving on the Astra Lancia, the majority of the sponsors came through it. Without that support, we would not have been able to win the World Cup title.
In order to be able to drive for the women’s championship, the driver had to take part in a certain number of races and yet in order to get points he had to be in the top twenty in the whole race. Partly for this reason, Sillankorva was able to secure the championship well in advance, but nonetheless, he had to go to start a couple of races from the end of the season.
– In Corsica we trained the first EK carefully and drove for a pretty good time. Then we just paused because that was enough for us. We did the same in Spain, for example.
In Argentina, Sillankorva drove not only the women’s full points, but also the tenth place in the entire World Championships.
– Achieving the championship was a great thing, although it didn’t change anything in the end. Even the era was a bit bad when the economic situation was challenging at the time.
Today, Minna Sillankorva runs various events and follows her daughter Suvi’s steps in motorsports.
– Motorsport is still strongly present in the family and it really unites us a lot. It’s nice that we all have an interest in the same topic.