Lada actually won a Swedish rally championship, around 1977, I think. Secret: Good driver/codriver and a well run organization behind them. And some luck.
They were very tough, competent motor cars. A friend of mine was involved in The Lada Challenge in the 80s, which was a clubman rally series. They were dirt cheap to buy, easy to work on, predictable handling with low performance and consequently well suited to the low skill levels of entry level motorsport.
And a class with nothing else competitive in it?
Skoda won many class championships and RAC rallies with the old rear engined cars back in the 80s, but for many of those wins they had very little competition.
I thought they competed with the rest of the 2WD natasp under 1300cc class? That was all of the standard hatches of the day.
They were another very basic car though, my Mum drove one, an Estelle 120L while I was a student in the late 80s, it was well behind the curve compared to things like Fiestas, which she had also owned. I do remember though, it was cheap. All the 18s. It was 18 months old, 18k miles, £1800, in 1986. Bright orange with a vinyl roof. Kept it 3 years, 40-odd thousand miles, traded it in for £1000 against a Fiesta. That's cheap motoring.
It was spectacularly slow with poor handling in the wet. Or dry, for that matter. It came into its own in snow, I used to play rally drivers in it during winter with the tail out and the rear wheels spinning in snowy corners. I can imagine in wet, muddy, icy stages of things like the RAC it would outperform FWD hatches because of better traction. That's if the head gasket held out.
There are sadly no more, last production or sale in the UK was after all about 1990. They are still around in Slovakia, driven by old people and the poor. There used to be one in Otley, in slush brown, I saw it in Leeds once, recognised the engine note before I saw it and turned around in disbelief. There is also a coupe in Leeds somewhere, I've seen it around. I think that the best thing you can say about them these days is that they are better than the S110R that they replaced. I'd have an S110R coupe over an 80s one for the looks, if I wanted one as a classic. But no thanks. They are slow, noisy and unpleasant to drive.