We’re beginning to wind down our reviews of the first 2018 wave of LEGO Speed Champions, and today we take a closer look at another Ford racecar, 75885 Ford Fiesta M-Sport WRC. The Ford Fiesta retails for $14.99, with 203 pieces and a minifig driver.
The LEGO car depicts a 2017 Ford Fiesta kitted out for World Rally Championship racing, in M-Sport team livery.
The box, instructions, & sticker sheet
Like other single-car sets in the Speed Champions line, the car comes in several unnumbered bags inside a small cardboard box.
The back of the box showcases the car’s play features (such as they are for such a small set, and we’ll cover them when discussing the finished model later in the review) along with a photo of the real racecar.
The instruction booklet is folded in half, and the sticker sheet is loose in the box along with the parts bags and black chassis piece.
And as you’d expect from a team car plastered with sponsorships, there are a lot of stickers. We continue to reiterate in each of these reviews that sticker sheets need to be handled differently in LEGO sets like this. While this particular sticker sheet arrived just fine, the sticker sheet in a recent Speed Champions set I purchased for myself was folded in half, creasing several of the stickers. I’m confident that the brilliant, creative manufacturing engineers at LEGO can find a solution to this troublesome issue.
The build
Speed Champions cars are always fairly quick builds, with a core built with plenty of studs-out brackets. The Ford Fiesta is no exception, and the first several steps build a variation on the common theme.
Things get fairly interesting a bit farther along — jumper plates are attached by their middle anti-stud to create a 5-wide platform above the rear fenders. Interestingly, yellow 1×1 round plates act as spacers throughout the car, presumably just smaller enough to be cheaper to produce than 1×1 square plates.
More brackets complete the structure for the side panels, and the front bumper comes together, attached studs-forward.
A whole bunch of curved slopes complete the front hood, side panels, and rear of the car, covered to within an inch of an inchworm’s life with all those stickers.
The set comes with two different versions of the hood (or bonnet, since M-Sport is a UK rallycar racing team). One version is just a plain curve, while the other has three large headlamps so you can zoom around blind curves in a forest at night, if that’s your kind of fun.
The finished model
The Ford Fiesta rallycar is both shorter and taller than most Speed Champions that depict low and long supercars. The front and rear wheels are attached at different heights, giving the whole car a rakish angle.
The rear spoiler gives the car a nice swoop, accentuating the car’s roguish good looks.
The rear of the car incorporates a central exhaust pipe surrounded by more curved slopes.
As I mentioned above, the front hood (bonnet) is modular, with a smooth panel that pops out so you can add one with lights for nighttime driving.
The parts & driver minifig
One of the reasons we love this set is because it includes several of the new 2×2 triangle tiles, in both dark blue and black.
The new tiles fit together in some interesting ways. I can’t wait to see LEGO builders incorporate these in mosaics, tiled floors, and more.
The minifig is your standard racecar driver minifig, with a printed waist and legs as well as torso. Sadly, the driver doesn’t get any hair under that helmet. We assume LEGO Speed Champions drivers go so fast all their hair falls out. (We’ll have to ask Ferrari 488 GT3 driver Christina Nielsen what her secret is…)
Conclusions & recommendation
We think the car is incredibly photogenic, and would look amazing drifting around a curve with a roostertail of dust and gravel. Check out lots more photos in the gallery at the end of this review. It will also look great on a desk or shelf as a display model. While many Speed Champions supercars look rather alike unless you look closely (though that’s certainly improving with the increasingly sophisticated design lately), the Ford Fiesta stands out from the rest with its chunky, angular look.
Speed Champions sets are also a really great value, with 203 pieces in this set for only $14.99. This set includes lots of dark blue, new 2×2 triangle tiles, and a huge array of curved slopes (in dark blue). As much as I like most of the other Speed Champions sets, this one’s decidedly different. If you’re looking for a Speed Champions set that stands apart from the rest, look no further than 75885 Ford Fiesta M-Sport WRC.
75885 Ford Fiesta M-Sport WRC is available now. You can purchase it from the LEGO Shop online ($14.99 in the US | $18.99 in Canada | £12.99 in the UK) and Amazon.com, as well as from multiple sellers on BrickLink and eBay.
The LEGO Group sent The Brothers Brick an early copy of this set for review. Providing TBB with products for review guarantees neither coverage nor positive reviews.
Read the rest of our 2018 LEGO Speed Champions reviews here on The Brothers Brick:
- 75884 1968 Ford Mustang Fastback
- 75886 Ferrari 488 GT3 “Scuderia Corsa”
- 75888 Porsche 911 RSR and 911 Turbo
- 75889 Ferrari Ultimate Garage
Any chance that when a sticker-heavy set is reviewed like this, that ya’ll could take a picture of the assembled set WITHOUT stickers first? I realize that’s a pain, but it would be a very cool addition.