Just two years later his father arranged a trip to Jan Churchill's Welsh Forest Rally School near Newtown, Powys, where Burns drove a Ford Escort for the day, and from that moment on he knew what he wanted to do.

Richard badgered his father into letting him join the Craven Motor Club, in his home town of Reading, where his talent was quickly spotted by David Williams, a rally enthusiast who would play a major role in Burns's early career.

[citation needed] At the end of 1995, Burns scored an impressive third place in the RAC Rally behind his Subaru teammates fighting for the overall championship, with Carlos Sainz (already a double world champion) finishing second, and Colin McRae winning his first and only WRC title.

Even so, the fending off of such calibre competition as works-backed Subaru heavyweights Kenneth Eriksson and Piero Liatti only added gloss to an increasingly favoured reputation.

Even so, a stirling comeback from the lower reaches of the top thirty to win on the season-ending Rally of Great Britain kept the Burns name well entrenched within public consciousness.

Fourth place in a rain-drenched Portugal kicked his campaign into action prior to second-place finishes on the gravel rallies of Argentina and Cyprus, on both occasions to Ford's Colin McRae.

Nonetheless, both the Scotsman and Monte Carlo victor Tommi Mäkinen were later to hit upon snags of their own, while Burns's own consistent points scoring culminated in a first and only individual rally victory of the season in New Zealand, with McRae beaten into second.

Burns then finished second on the Rally Australia to close within two points of new standalone series leader McRae, although the Scotsman and Mäkinen were to struggle to fifth and sixth respectively on this event (and the last of the drivers' points-scoring positions) amid controversy over McRae arriving to time control too late at the end of the first leg of the event to be able to choose a favourable running order on the ball-bearing gravel for day two.

Meanwhile, the Finn, for his part, continued to struggle with a newly homologated version of the Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution World Rally Car he had been entrusted with, which had only been introduced by his team a few rounds earlier in San Remo.

A four-way title decider, also including nine-point adrift outsider, Ford driver Carlos Sainz, thus beckoned on the final round of the series in Great Britain.

Although Peugeot were the pacesetting team of the period, Burns had difficulty matching the pace of team-mates Marcus Grönholm (on gravel) and Gilles Panizzi (on tarmac).

He cobbled together a title challenge, albeit founded more on regular podium finishes than on victories, for much of the 2003 season – a feat which did not convince him to remain at the wheel of the 206 WRC.

The gloomy prospect of a continued winning drought with the French team left Burns poised to rejoin Subaru, having signed for them for the second time beginning with the 2004 season, the ploy being to couple him with the eventual 2003 title winner, Norway's Petter Solberg.

[12] A memorial service was held at St Luke's Church, Chelsea on Thursday 22 December 2005,[13] with readings from BBC TV's Jeremy Clarkson and Steve Rider, and a tribute paid by one of his closest friends, photographer Colin McMaster.

[15][16] During the 2006 Goodwood Festival of Speed, the RB foundation, named for Burns's initials, was inaugurated, with its stated aim being to "inspire and support people with serious injury and illness.