Coral Taylor: “This is the place I like to be.” | Interviews

I have exciting news. For the past few months I have been working as an intern for the wonderful organisation Females in Motorsport. In 2021, the founder of the website, Helena, gave me the fantastic opportunity to write a guest article for FinM. The incredible work of the FinM team has been instrumental in fuelling my passion for the sport and making me aware of the variety of roles available in the industry.

A few months ago I had the pleasure of interviewing Extreme E champion Molly Taylor for OTPW. She recommended that I speak to the woman who sparked her passion for rallying – her mother, experienced co-driver Coral Taylor.

Rally driving is almost a tradition in the family, starting with Coral’s father, Norm Fritter. Both Coral and her husband have made careers in the sport. Molly told me she thinks it’s just what all mothers do. That made Coral laugh.

Coral was introduced to rallying at a young age. She took part in events but “didn’t really understand it” and didn’t really think about a career in motorsport.

“…my knowledge of the sport was very limited. I thought I understood that people got in cars and drove fast on dirt roads, but I had no understanding at all.”

In 1979, Coral embarked on a “hard adventure” – she entered her first rally, the Repco Round Trial. Driving as a co-driver for her father, Coral prepared by taking co-driver courses with a car club and taking part in local events. The Repco is known for its brutality: the two-week event required drivers to drive all over Australia.

“…nowadays they wouldn’t be allowed to do events like that. Mainly for all sorts of health and safety reasons, because we were expected to do 48 hours straight for three weeks, day and night, covering huge distances and being very tired. But I loved it, which seems crazy for something that was so hard and so different to anything I’d ever done. …it was what sparked my love of rallying and from that day on I stuck with it. It wasn’t just the one-off adventure that I was going to do and then move on from.”

“For me it was something completely new, completely foreign and completely unexpected.”

In a rally car, co-drivers sit in the passenger seat and comment on a series of codes (called “pace notes”), which may follow different systems and differ in terms of the emphasis on descriptive and numerical elements.

The purpose is to “…paint the driver a picture of what he has in front of him at every corner… almost as if a video was playing in front of the driver’s eyes before each corner… in rallies, winning or losing a stage can sometimes be decided by a fraction of a second, so any hesitation or braking can cost so much time. It’s a system that allows a car to physically drive through each corner as quickly as possible and link a stage together. That teamwork – that’s what I love about rally driving.”

“Sometimes you get drowning in the logistics and preparations for an event and you wonder, ‘Why am I doing this, it’s taking up my whole life.’ But then you’re in the car. The moment I’m in the car, I always think, ‘This is why we do everything we do’ – for this. This is where I like to be.”

Outside of her work as a co-driver, Coral is also involved in motorsport and automotive associations, such as the Board of Motorsport Australia. Coral stressed that her passion comes from the people in motorsport and the community aspect of rallying. Through this work, she wants to give something back to the sport, which relies so heavily on volunteers who dedicate their time to planning and structuring events.

“… (it’s) such a great group of people from all walks of life – the people who rally. Everyone is so passionate about the sport and there’s a very strong sense of camaraderie between the teams and the people too.”

When it comes to career highlights, Coral is not short of impressive achievements. She has competed in several rounds of the World Rally Championship and is a five-time Australian Rally Champion.

Among these championship successes, Coral acknowledged a poignant moment of sportsmanship.

“…there was one moment that has always stuck with me over the years. It was actually the first year I was co-driving for Neal (Bates – Coral’s long-term driving partner) and we were racing against Possum Bourne… In those years it was Toyota versus Subaru, Neal Bates versus Possum Bourne. And it was… my first rally with Neal and we were already halfway through the first day. We were actually leading, which we were pretty excited about.”

“Back then, there was no dedicated service park for maintenance like there is today – instead, the service teams would drive and just park on the side of the road. So when you came out of a stage, the service teams would park there. It was a narrow stretch of road and all the service teams would park on either side of the road waiting for their cars to come in, stop and do some fuel and repairs… as we drove through, we passed where Possum’s team was set up… and as we drove past, they all lined up on the side of the road and started clapping as we drove past. Even now I get goosebumps thinking about it, it was a very emotional moment – ​​when your main rival team at the event clapped because they thought what we had just done was amazing, to be leading the event at that moment. It’s something I’ll never forget.”

A huge thank you to Coral for her time and for sharing her story with me. Coral’s dedication and remarkable attitude show how inspirational she is.

Good luck to Coral and the Toyota team this season!