KEVIN Procter came away from Lydden Hill in Kent on Easter Monday disappointed after the first round of the Quaife MSA British Rallycross Championship.

After starting from pole position, Leeming Bar’s Procter, in his Ford Focus, won the Supercar ‘A’ final, leading home Dutchman Jos Kuypers in his Ford Focus and the Citroen C4 of Englishman Liam Doran. In the Superfinal, they were joined by reigning Belgian champion Jochen Coox and his compatriot Koen Pauwels with Binks starting fifth on the grid.

Procter and Doran were side by side into the first corner, Doran taking the lead by running a wide line and going around the outside of Procter.

The two remained evenly matched until the second lap when Procter took his turn in the ‘Joker Lap’ section.

Closing quickly on Doran again in the late stages of the race, Procter challenged for the lead when Doran took the Joker Lap but Procter was denied victory when a centre differential failure pitched the car into a spin and out of the race with a lap left to run.

Procter’s problem left Doran with breathing space and he completed his first event as a Citroën driver by taking the win ahead of Pauwels.

Northallerton driver Dave Bellerby was in action in the new Suzuki Swift series and, despite some minor suspension problems on the Peter Gwynne Motorsport- prepared car, he took victory in both heats before claiming first place in the final.

Daughter Paige was in action in only her second meeting and after winning a heat, she claimed second place in the Juniors final behind the defending champion Brad Bailey and once again gave him a run for his money.

Mark Watson, of Barnard Castle, progressed as far as the Supercar B final in his Jersey Farm Hotel sponsored Citroen Xsara before gearbox problems halted his charge, and Morton on Swale’s Jonny Bean made the leap up to the Super Modified class in his Snigwig-backed BMW and came away with a superb victory in the B final from the back of the grid before radiator problems denied him in the A final.

THE annual Easter Sprint at Croft last Easter Monday, organised by Darlington & District Motor Club, provided a titanic battle in the SDB British Championship and with 24 of the country’s quickest single seater racing cars, some with over 450bhp, it was always going to be close.

Running from a standing start over 1.9 miles of the challenging 2.1 mile Croft circuit, it was Scot Roy Napier who first laid down the gauntlet setting a time of 69.84 seconds. Then it was Terry Holmes on 68.67 followed by followed by Stewart Robb Junior who took another second off the time.

With just two cars left to run, including 2009 Champion Nick Algar from Stocksfield, it looked as though it was all over.

Nick stormed around to record a time of 67.09 but Stewart Robb snr had other ideas.

A perfect start and the Pilbeam MP88 launched in to what was to be the fastest time of the day, stopping the clocks on 66.66 seconds at an average speed of 102.6 mph.

The event also catered for various other national Championships with a number of local drivers. Regular British Championship contender, Simon Bainbridge from Stokesley, normally drives a highly modified Audi TT but as the car wasn’t ready he came out in his road going Audi RS6.

A very quick car outclassed against his usual competitors but nevertheless Simon gained valuable points for the championship.

Darlington’s Mark Leybourne took his Westfield SEiW 1600 to a class win ahead of his circuit racing debut in a fortnight’s time. Headlam Hall general manager, Thomas Robinson, contesting his first ever motorsport event in his roadgoing Porsche 996 GT3 was rewarded with second in class, while Pickhill’s Tracey Taylor- West ran her Lotus Elise to a fine second in the hotly contested class three.

Stuart Clough, from Northallerton, claimed fourth place in the same class in his Renault Alpine A110, whereas Ferryhill minicrosser David Bell claimed second in class 3A in his 1300cc Austin Mini. Richmond’s Rhys Palmer also dominated class 1A in his Rover 114.

The next event is hosted by BARC next weekend where the DDMC organised Northern Saloon & Sports Car Championship will be part of the action.

GUISBOROUGH British Superbike Championship team Swan Honda got their season off to a good start when Kendal rider James Ellison took a superb second race victory at the Kent circuit over Easter to get team boss Shaun Muir’s title bid underway.

Hartburn youngster Richard Ferguson was in 125cc action making his debut at Brands Hatch and, following heavy rain in practice, he gradually upped his speed to qualify in 36th place.

In the race, Richard got a flying start which put him in the top 20 for the first couple of laps before managing to pass his closest rival as they crossed the line finishing a very respectable 21st place against much more experienced opposition.

KARTING ace Rob Shield, of Cleasby, was in action last weekend in the first round of the Junior TKM Super 1 championship.

The Richmond schoolboy had a difficult weekend, eventually finishing 19th in the standings.

The first heat on Saturday saw Shield make his way up to fifth but due to engine problems finished 11th.

On Sunday, in the second heat, he started from eighth but due to a first corner incident, struggled to get going again and finished towards the back of the field.

However, his pace was good enough to match the front runners and he set extremely fast times.

In the third heat Shield started from the back of the 29- strong grid but quickly made his way up to the front but again was involved in an incident and ultimately finished 21st.

He began the first of the two finals in 20th and drove well to finish 13th and in the second final, starting from 13th, he was again involved in an incident which saw Shield off the track and have to fight his way back.

SCORTON’S Max Coates started his car racing career last weekend at Thruxton where he was racing among Britain’s top drivers in the Ginetta Junior Championship, which is a support race on the British Touring Car Championship series.

Televised on ITV4, Max put in a strong qualifying performance in greasy conditions on Saturday to claim 18th and 17th places on the grid for rounds one and two respectively and drove two solid races to finish where he started both times.

However, the results didn’t reflect his performance as he was knocked off in race one and spun out of 13th place when pushing to the limit in race two.

The team will head to Northamptonshire for the next two rounds of the championship at Rockingham.