AFTER many years of knocking on the door Nigel Jenkins finally took his maiden BTRDA 1400 series category win on last weekend's Nicky Grist Stages ably assisted by new co-driver Herefordshire based Dan Petrie in the NJ Autos 1400 Nova.

The event which was a qualifying round of the British Rally Championship BTRDA and Welsh series and attracted a huge 160 car entry to the picturesque Welsh market town of Builth Wells, writes Paul Willetts.

Eight tests were on offer, comprising two loops of four stages in the classic forests of Crychan Halfway interspersed with a midday service back in Builth Wells.

In his first proper gravel event for a long time Jenkins was hot on the heels of leader Pete Gorst from the off setting some excellent times and arrived back at the mid day service 41 seconds behind.

But now with his rustiness gone Jenkins had reduced the lead to 20 seconds and nine miles of Crychan remaining.

Less than a mile before the end of the stage the leader crashed leaving Jenkins to take a richly deserved classification victory by well over a minute, 47th overall and maximum BTRDA 1400 points.

Jenkins said: "It's been a long time coming this 1400 win but its nice, I had blown the cobwebs away by the second loop and really pushed hard, so hopefully this will be like buses now, thanks to Dan he did a great job alongside me."

The 1400 category saw another great battle between Luke Watts with Ryan Taylor on the notes in the NJ Autos and James Dunkley who had Jack Morris alongside in JD Autoservices Corsa 1400.

These two slogged it out all day swapping times for the final class position, going into the final stage Dunkley held a 17 second advantage but a mammoth effort from Watts on only his second ever gravel rally saw him take 24 seconds to take third in class.

In the Inter-club field Bob Morgan with Adrian Williams on the notes in the Winner Garage Skoda Fabia R5 scored another good haul of Welsh championship points with a trouble free run to ninth overall and third in class despite a few small offs and tyres going off.

Robert Gough was yet another with a new co-driver for the day with the experienced Sam Collis with Jack Bowen committed to Perry Gardner on BTRDA events.

Despite the heat and tyre degradation on the Escort RS1800 they had a great battle with the Fiat 131 of Nick Elliott, and just six seconds separated the duo at the end with Gough settling for 21st overall, third Historic and second in class.

Gough said: "I had a real go in the last one and despite shot tyres we were second fastest historic, and were moving forward the speed is coming with every event, thanks to Sam for stepping in he did a great job."

It was certainly a day to forget for Ben Friend and Cliffy Simmons in the Allglass Anglia Escort RS1800 who had a persistent misfire from the off so decided to miss stage four and head back to service to try and rectify it.

They then rejoined for the afternoon loop under the super rally rules with a car that pulled for match practice and were classified 110th overall.

Sadly the long awaited return of Nik Elsmore in the CDS Taxis Evo 9 was short lived when head gasket failure at the end of stage three brought retirement to bring a premature end to their event.