Birchall battles to BCCC win at Forrest Estate

Justin Birchall won his first BCCC event of the season after a very challenging event at Forrest Estate in South West Scotland.

Martin Gould, winner of the opening two rounds, led early on but his Buxton 4x4 Rivet succumbed to engine problems on the fourth run which handed the lead to Birchall. Despite a blown diff and some punctures Birchall built a lead of 1m 31s over the eight runs of day one with Adrian Marfell in second in his Fouquet Nissan.

There were a further seven runs on day two and Birchall continued to head the leaderboard, his winning margin ending at 1m 40s. Marfell claimed his best BCCC result to date with second.

“I’m very pleased with the result, it was a really tough weekend which was hard on the cars and crews,” said Birchall. “After the diff blew we tried a new competition version but that was pulling the car to the side so we ended up using a standard one which wasn’t ideal but we did enough to clinch the win.”

Lee Mansfield and Ryan Cooke had an event-long battle in their respective Milners with Mansfield eventually taking third and Cooke fourth. Both crews had their share of issues over the weekend with Mansfield surviving a high-speed brush with the scenery and Cooke suffering major clutch problems.

Another pair of drivers enjoying a close fight were Rob Bool and Mark Jacques, Bool bringing his ex-championship winning car home in fifth ahead of Jacques in sixth. Britpart's Paul Myers was seventh, just 20 seconds ahead of the JRG Clio V8 of Steve Smith.

Mike Moran set some quick times in his Lofthouse Evo but problems with the car on day one resulted a maximum which dropped him down the leaderboard. Richard Coleby completed the top ten in his Polaris.

In the BCC Trophy Paul Rowlands took his Can-Am DS to victory ahead of the Insanity Racing Tornado of Jon Damrel. 

Pat Masters repeated his round one win in the Freelander Challenge ahead of Team Sheepie's Ian Linford. Ian Morson was third.

2016 BCC Trophy champion Phill Bayliss returned to the BCCC in style with a win in the Clubman category.

BCCC Top 10
1. Justin Birchall/Jonny Koonja (Lofthouse Freelander) 01:49:45
2. Adrian Marfell/Paul Bartleman (Fouquet Nissan) 01:51:25
3. Lee Mansfield/David Roberts (Milner R5) 01:54:28
4. Ryan Cooke/Darren Cooke (Milner LRM-1) 01:55:10
5. Rob Bool/Aaron Burch (AT Indy Challenger) 01:58:59
6. Mark Jacques/Adam Nicholson (Lofthouse Freelander) 01:59:29
7. Paul Myers/Martin Myers (Land Rover Tornado) 02:00:30
8. Steve Smith/John Griffith (JRG Clio V8) 02:00:50
9. Mike Moran/Tony Coid (Lofthouse Evo) 02:05:54
10. Richard Coleby (Polaris RZR XP Turbo) 02:09:50