1. Nicholas Mark Grist was born on 1 November 1961 and is a British former rally co-driver from Wales, born in Ebbw Vale.
22 Facts About Nicky Grist
1. 2.
Nicky Grist won 21 rallies with more than one driver.
3.
Nicky Grist's first WRC win was in the Rally Argentina in 1993 with Juha Kankkunen, who at that time was a three times WRC champion.
4.
Nicky Grist stayed as Kankkunen's co-driver until 1997 when he joined Colin McRae with the 555 Subaru World Rally Team.
5.
Nicky Grist remained Colin McRae's co-driver until the Rally New Zealand 2002, during which time the pair won 17 rallies, 27 podium finishes and gained overall 183 WRC points.
6.
Nicky Grist started his career as a golf professional at the Monmouthshire Golf Club, and then joined a local car sales centre, where he was given Sundays off.
7.
Nicky Grist became a full-time professional co-driver with the Ford Motor Company and driver Malcolm Wilson.
8.
Nicky Grist joined Mitsubishi with driver Armin Schwarz, in the WRC, but during the Rally Argentina joined Juha Kankkunen.
9.
Kankkunen and Nicky Grist went on to win two more rallies, Rally Australia and the Rally GB.
10.
In 1995, with only two rallies to go, Kankkunen and Nicky Grist started the Rally Catalunya in a comfortable lead, seven points ahead of Colin McRae and the 555 Subaru World Rally Team, when they crashed and had to retire.
11.
In 1996, Nicky Grist competed with Kankkunen for private Toyota teams in three events and finished fourth in Sweden, third in Indonesia and second in Finland.
12.
In 2003, Nicky Grist began working for TV, on the programmes that produced the rally coverage for broadcasters around the world.
13.
Nicky Grist primarily worked for two different programmes, Speed TV in the US and the other the review programme that went out worldwide for all the WRC rounds.
14.
Nicky Grist worked as the presenter of the programme for Speed TV, explaining the rules and showing why a particular stage is a challenge.
15.
In 2005, Nicky Grist again joined Colin McRae as co-driver, in a Skoda Fabia WRC, for the Rally GB.
16.
Nicky Grist regularly sits in the co-drivers seat for various drivers such as the Roger Albert Clark Rally amongst other events, but has mostly retired from co-driving and is heading his own motorsports business.
17.
Nicky Grist appeared in a special episode of the British automotive magazine show Fifth Gear alongside Mark Higgins, instructing the hosts as they participate in a rally.
18.
In 2019 Nicky Grist participated in the non-competitive Eifel Rallye Festival as a driver in his Celica GT4 ST185, his first event since 2001's Omloop van Vlaanderen where he took the driver's seat.
19.
In 1998, whilst racing with Colin McRae, Codemasters developed a game for PlayStation and Microsoft Windows entitled Colin McRae Rally, in which Nicky Grist lent his voice and likeness as a co-driver, guiding players around various special stages in eight countries.
20.
Nicky Grist later reprised his role as one of the default co-drivers in Dirt 4.
21.
In 2006, Ludovico and Elena Fassitelli, the Italian owners and creators of Stilo helmets, approached Grist to become the sole UK distributor of the Stilo range and through this he set up Nicky Grist Motorsport, based near his home in Pontrilas, Herefordshire.
22.
Nicky Grist married Sharon in 1993, at Abergavenny, Wales, in the middle of the recce for Rally Portugal.