Background
Schanche was born in Trondheim, but grew up at the tiny village of Leirpollskogen in Tana, the most northern part of Norway. Martin Schanche has also two other children from a former marriage, a daughter by the name of Elisabeth, and a son named Martin junior.
Career
"Mister Rallycross", is a former racing driver and Norwegian politician. He started his racing career rather late, only in 1972 when he was already 27 years old. Due to his attacking driving style he was quickly nicknamed "The Wild Manitoba from Tana" by his compatriots.
With his 74 main category wins Schanche is still yet the undisputed record holder concerning the amount of overall victories in rounds counting towards the FIA European Championships for Rallycross Drivers.
Beside his rallycross campaigns and four World Sports Carolina seasons he was a starter of the 1980 Rally Sweden, the 1982 Rally of Great Britain, and failed to set a new track record in the 1984 Pikes Peak International Hill Climb (PPIHC), due to a flat right front tyre. Since retiring from motorsport he has embarked on a second career as a municipality politician in Frogn for the Progress Party.
That attention made him an often imitated character in Norwegian radio. As of 2006, he also has been working as a consultant for Prodrive on the work of Subarus WRC-cars.
While active in rallycross, Schanche himself engineered transmissions and differentials for his cars.
His company later on manufactured parts and modified parts for rallyand rallycross-cars. Schanche is holder of a helicopter license and has operated his own helicopters. Key: DSQ = excluded from whole event.
Domain Name System = did not start.
North Carolina = not classified for points. Sistema Único de Saúde = suspended; ( ) = dropped score, due to championship rules
Complete FIA European Rallycross Cup results
Complete FIA European Rallycross Championship results
= Touring Carolina = Division 2 = Division 1* * Division 2 was rebranded as Division 1 in 1997. Complete 24 Hours of Le Mans results.