Mongol Rally: “Health and Safety – F&*% You!”

You’ve probably heard of it but even if you haven’t, you no doubt know someone who knows someone who’s taken part. Just to prompt your memory, the challenge is to drive from Goodwood in West Sussex some 10,000 miles to Mongolia – all in a car with an engine smaller than 1.2-litres. Simples.

“Travelling is all a bit wimpy these days and what people really need is to get stuck, arrested, shot at and to break down in the middle of nowhere”, says the Rally’s founder. The event has been running since 2004 when six intrepid teams set off for Mongolia and serves as “a big fuck you to health and safety”, claims its oh-so-wise founder.

The 2012 event launched on 14^th July and teams are now scattered everywhere from Northern France to Estonia to Iran. The organisers have even plotted a handy map showing where teams are, to terrify rallyers’ nervous parents and to remind everyone else just how far away Mongolia really is.

In order to understand why parents are quite so worried, take a look at some of the knackered wheels this year’s teams are driving to Mongolia:

If all this has got your road trip juices flowing head over to The Adventurists' website as registration for the 2013 rally has just opened.