RHYL students have been given a sneak peak at a £70,000 rally car ahead of its appearance at the Wales Rally GB.

Motor Vehicle students at Coleg Llandrillo’s Rhyl campus were given the opportunity of ‘grilling’ 21-year-old Welsh rally driver James Williams on his Opel Adam R2 rally car.

The driver - whose car costs £19 per kilometre to run - gave a joint presentation with Ben Buesnel from Motorsport UK gave a joint presentation on the engineering behind the vehicle and how to set up a rally car for different surfaces - gravel, tarmac and snow - before providing general information on the World Rally Championship.

Motor Vehicle tutor Stuart Frost said: “The students asked some really pertinent questions and were delighted to be able to see a championship rally car and driver close up. A lot of them will be going into the mechanical and engineering side of the motor industry, so to learn about the technical specifications of a British Rally Championships-prepared car first-hand was invaluable.”

Mr Williams was sixth in this year’s British Rally Championships - which we won for the second consecutive year by Rhos-on-Sea's Matt Edwards - and will be racing in Wales Rally GB this weekend in and around the rally HQ in Llandudno.

Both guests answered a wide variety of rally-related questions: from the cost of running a rally car, through how to become a rally driver, to how the burgeoning electric car market will affect rallying in the near future.

Mr Buesnel said: “We were delighted to be able to show the students a rally car that will be taking place in the forthcoming Wales Rally GB, which is part of the World Rally Championships. It is amazing for the people of North Wales to have the world’s best cars and drivers in the world on their doorstep.”

Graham Nutt, who is the North Wales manager for the Engineering Education Scheme Wales, represented the Wales Rally GB and arranged the event in partnership with International Motorsport and Coleg Llandrillo.

Mr Nutt also brought in the Toyota GT86 car that was involved in a recent schools competition, where pupils got the chance to design the livery on the car.