According to Kenyan media, Doughty died on Monday in a hospital in Nairobi. He was 88 years old.
Doughty was born in Tanzania in 1936. He competed successfully as a co-driver during the 1970s and 1980s, most notably alongside Shekhar Mehta.
Mehta and Doughty secured four consecutive Safari Rally victories together from 1979 to 1982. Three of those wins came with Datsun and one with Nissan.
Doughty remains the only co-driver to have claimed four victories in Kenya’s iconic World Rally Championship event.
During his career, Doughty represented several factory teams including Audi, Nissan, Peugeot, and Lancia. After retiring from competition, he worked as the director of the Safari Rally, among other roles.
Doughty was highly respected within the Kenyan motorsport community.
“I did one rally with Mike, which was great. So precise and prompt, a great organiser and left nothing to chance. He knew the routes inside out and produced excellent notes,” recalled Ann Taieth, a pioneering female driver in the Kenyan rally series.
Doughty spent his final years in a care home in Nairobi.
“Deep inside me, there are three unfulfilled desires I want to achieve before I depart from this world; jump from a plane in a parachute, drive a Formula One car and fly an autogyro,” Doughty said in an interview with Kenya’s Daily Nation last autumn.
