With one round to go, Mark Higgins and Bryan Thomas have claimed the biggest crown in British rallying, with second place on the Trackrod Rally good enough to secure the Kwik-Fit Pirelli British Rally Championship title.
However, their achievement was almost overshadowed by Britain's youngest ever winner of a British Championship event, as 18-year-old team-mate Matthew Wilson drove his Eddie Stobart Ford Focus to victory.
"I was so full of nerves over the last three stages," the son of M-Sport boss Malcolm Wilson said at the finish. "I heard everything and I felt everything, but the car was absolutely fine. I was really quite hopeful this morning. Mark only took eight seconds out of me on the first one this morning and I thought, 'that's only half a second a mile, I can live with that' and then he only took half a second out of me on the next one. But when he spun on the third one that really allowed me to relax a bit.
"I'm just so pleased and I can't thank the Stobart directors, Andrew Tinkler and William Stobart, enough for giving me this chance to come back after my accident with no hopes of the title, but they've been fantastic this year. The whole team has been fantastic. They gave Scott [Martin] and I the car and the support to do the job. And Scott was fantastic today too. After our problems on the recce, the notes worked well this morning and Scott kept giving me confidence on every stage, it was a real team effort."
Second was enough to clinch a second title for Higgins and he admitted that was what his focus was on getting the points needed rather than pushing for victory.
"It's not like my first title, this one was more of a relief really," he said. "I was on the comfortable side of 'flat-out' this morning but Matthew was driving really well. Second place was good enough to clinch the title so that's what I concentrated on."
Steve Perez finished third, with Jonny Milner claiming the production class honours in fourth.
"Before the start of this rally I wouldn't have believed a Production win was possible, all I was aiming for was to match the 'works team' times by the finish, but they had their troubles," he said. "That's rallying and I'm delighted."
Equally delighted was Barry Clark who took maximum Kwik-Fit Pirelli Production points (as Milner is not registered), with his performance setting up a tantalising finish to the final round of the British Championship next month at the Tempest Stages Rally. With rival Rory Galligan's non-finish the race for this year's British production Cup title is not over, with Lorna Smith still involved after finishing sixth.
