We had to pick ourselves up after the engine problems continued to haunt us on the Mid Wales Stages, round 4 of the championship. We managed to finish 9^th out of the 15 1.9 Scholarship starters but the engine once again was on its last legs. But pick it up I did, and back with regular co-driver, Craig Burgess in the car, we contested Swansea Bay Rally, a forest rally based in the valleys of South Wales. The Swansea Bay Rally is a rally loved by many crews as it takes in a lot of the stages used by the WRC drivers on British World Rally Championship Round. This meant that these were to be some of the most demanding stages that we had ever contested on. With the third rebuilt engine of the year we were keeping our fingers crossed that we had finally got it right.

SS1 Rhondda and on the way to the first stage, it was quite clear that it was going to be a difficult one. The mist was low and visibility was down to about thirty metres in places. The car was running well, though I had never driven in the mist before and will admit that I backed off too much on that stage and should have had more faith in the notes.

SS2 Tyle was a much clearer stage completely different to Rhondda, fast and flowing and I started to adjust to the new suspension set-up that seemed to be working very well.

Onto SS3 Walters Arena, a 3.5 mile stage which is a spectator’s delight, made up of a series of twists and turns, humps and jumps makes it great fun to drive as well. After seeing the times from the first two stages I knew I had been going too slow and so pushed up the pace through the Arena. A massive moment at over 80mph saw us nearly having a big off, but quick reactions saved the day and we continued on to set the 4^th fastest Scholarship time.

We continued to push through SS4 Rheola and my confidence increased more and more setting another top 5 time. The stage had some really fast sections, flat in fifth with no room for error and it really tests driver confidence.

The longest stage of the day was SS5. A 15 mile test through the renowned Resolfen and it proved to be tricky and caught a number of the crews out. The stage was hard on us and I unfortunately “fell asleep” half way through the stage and lost time because of it.

We got back to the finish ramp to find we had achieved our best result of the year and my best career finish to date, 3^rd out of the 14 Scholarship entrants and with that our first taste of prize money in the process. The rally will be broadcast on Sky Sports in a few weeks so keep an eye out for the red, white and blue SDM Machine!

It was such a relief to have an engine that was not ready to blow and to not have to watch the gauges instead of the road all day. I must give a big thanks to WF and GE Lighting for paying for 8 forest rally tyres for the rally, which is fantastic support.

We also thank local company Britannia MOT Centre, Aylesford for providing the fuel for the Service Vehicle which chased us round South Wales all day. We are looking forward to the next round, the Trackrod Rally which is a round of the British Rally Championship on the 2^nd and 3^rd October and is based in North Yorkshire.