Home favourite Bogie turns the heat on rivals

IN CONDITIONS more akin to the Safari Rally, Scotland's most talented young rally ace, 22-year-old David Bogie, took a significant step towards retaining his Hankook Scottish Championship when he dominated the latest round, the RSAC Scottish Rally in Dumfries.

Under cloudless blue skies Bogie, from Dumfries, powered his Mitsubishi Evo IX to fastest times through four of the event's six dry and dusty stages to win by 19.2secs ahead of the Mitsubishi of Lockerbie's Mike Faulkner.

"It's fantastic to win my home event in front of my family and so many friends," said Bogie, who now leads the championship by 13 points from Bothwell's Alick Kerr after five of the eight rounds. "It was important to go out and establish myself right from the first stage, and thankfully that's what we did. After that it was a case of controlling our pace, keeping the car on the road and making sure we didn't drop any time. It's still far too early to think about retaining the championship, but there's no denying winning today is a major boost to my title aspirations."

Alness driver David Wilson recorded the best finish of his SRC career by grabbing third place in his Mitsubishi – 56.6s behind Faulkner – edging Kerr's Subaru back to fourth by just 1.8s.

Bogie's cause was aided by the retirement of another title rival, Jock Armstrong,

early in stage one, the 7.9-miler at Ae South, when a puncture pitched his Subaru Impreza into a ditch.