Last updated 19:49, Thursday, 25 September 2008

THE penultimate round of the TJ Services Northern speed championship was at Harewood House over in Yorkshire, a fantastic purpose built venue in the rolling North Yorkshire hills.

NINTH: Steve Palmer took ninth at Harewood in his Micra

The hill is owned by the British Automobile Racing Club and always attracts a lot of very fast locals who spend their whole year just competing at the venue - often in very expensive cars - which makes it difficult for the Wigton entrants to get good results.

This year things were different though with a very impressive set of results from the Cumbrians despite an entry of over 160 cars.

In the 1400cc road car class David Wiggins in his 205 won despite a massive entry finishing over two seconds ahead of the second placed driver.

Martin Peacock put on a spectacular show in his near standard 106 and managed fourth with his wife Sally only a fraction behind in sixth.

Stephen Palmer was on one of his last outings in the Micra and took ninth. Simon Down made a welcome return to the series in his beautiful Lancia Fulvia taking 10th just ahead of Alastair Dundee in another Micra.

In the modified road cars, Paul Rigg managed a creditable ninth in another huge class. Peter Sewell took 16th place in the same class despite early problems that saw him betting towed up the hill by the course officials! Dennis Hope who was sharing the MG with Paul Rigg came in 19th.

In the road kit car class Harry Moody took a well deserved class win despite some uncharacteristic early madness that saw him off the track.

In the modified production car class Martyn Stott was just pipped into second place by one of the local specialists while Jim Evans came in an excellent fourth place showing once again that his Midget is a force to be reckoned with. Mike Hunter pushed his Metro very hard and came in sixth place, just ahead of Colin Sutherland.

In the modified production kit car class Colin Birkbeck took second place after leading right up until the last run of the day and was half a second ahead of James Cummings who was making a welcome return to the series after a few events away.

James clocked 91mph through the speed trap, one of the fastest recorded speeds of the day - pretty impressive in a road legal car!

Chris Boyd came fourth and had another incident free day. Jim O’Neill dusted down his Westfield for a one off appearance and took sixth just a few 10ths back.

In the larger capacity class Terry Coleman took a class win ahead of his son Darren in their Cosworth powered Sylva.

Having recorded a win at Harewood in the sports libre class in damp conditions earlier in the year, the pressure was on Angus Buchan who unfortunately couldn’t keep up with the locals in the dry but still took fifth place.

In the 1100cc racing cars Peter Garforth took third place and was just outside the overall top 10 for the day. In the larger capacity racing cars, Mark Hemingway made a rare appearance in a stunning carbon fibre Force that someone had lent him!

He made good use of the car and took first in class and fastest time of the day overall on the very last run of the day.

The championship moves on to its final round at Kames in Ayrshire on October 5.

MG Cumbria held their Reivers’ Raid tour on Sunday in superb weather with entries coming from a wide area. The lunch halt at Mellerstain was particularly popular.

Ed Glaister was out of luck at the Goodwood Revival when a new engine blew up. Despite sterling work to virtually build another engine, that too failed putting Ed and co-driver Patrick Tambay out of the touring car race.

There is plenty of action this weekend. Furthest travelled will be Bill Kirkpatrick who heads for Belgium for the Spa Six Hour race in his MGB. There is also racing at Croft in the final race of the season there.

Undoubtedly the main event will be up in the Trossachs with the McRae Stages which boasts an entry list that could well be considered better than current WRC events.

As a tribute to the late Colin McRae, many top driver have entered including most of the Flying Finns with Ari Vatanen teamed up with Dave Richards again in an Escort while Malcolm Wilson debuts his new historic spec Escort and Matt Wilson has borrowed a Focus WRC 05 and will be a contender for outright honours.