The Fairfield Merlin Stages saw an epic battle all day between a number of the junior crews. Charlie Mathewson, Rhys Jones and McKenzie Snowden were locked in battle for most of the day. Oliver Waggett was in there too but a spin early in the day dropped him down the order. For much of the day the top five were separated by seconds and spread across four different makes of cars. Jack Birch was as ever mixing it up in the Micra but was still suffering from gearbox gremlins, but at a venue that is possibly more suited to the C1’s etc he was putting up a good fight. The event saw Kyle Green out for the first time this year and Co Driven by ex junior Dylan Fowler-Bishop and showing good pace in the Skoda Citigo. Riley Chester and Julian Fouquet in the Micras were mixing thing up in the middle of the pack with Riley coming out victorious on the day with 7th overall. Interestingly Micras are currently 3rd, 4th and 7th in the overall championship standings showing these cars are still a force to be reckoned with and all after the pre 03 trophy at the end of the year. Josh Slaughter split the Micras from the top five with a strong drive into 6th, now with Emma Morrison back in the co drivers seat. Daniel Taylor had another disastrous day with I believe driveshaft issues meaning a stage maximum from a strong showing. The lady drivers both had a good day though not quite as good for Ellie picking up some damage on one of the later stages. Great to see the girls out there and if we can get Motor Sport UK to realise that girls rally and not just race they may get the recognition they deserve. Lewis Arnold was consistent all day was another driver with a new co driver for the event and took 9th overall.

The pace at the front was hot all day but the battles with the newer drivers were just as intense ads the timing sheets showed. In the end Charlie took the win by a mere two seconds from Rhys and I think that is just exceptional and the standard of this young talent never ceases to amaze me. A couple of drivers have a few wounds to lick but once again we had a 100 per cent finishing record which is fantastic.

Sadly the next round planned at Weeton is on hold due to venue difficulties and so we hope that Caerwent will be running in September.