HEREFORDSHIRE Motor Club held their Humfrys & Symonds Builth Showground Stages at The Royal Welsh Showground with a full entry of 55 crews.

Leominster's John Perrott, co-driven by Keaton Williams, had won the rally in 2016 and led the field in their Leominster Car Auctions Escort MkII.

A good battle would ensue between the Nova crew of Sam Davies and Martin Lasper and Len Jones and Don James driving an Escort MkII, with Davies and Lasper opening a 4four-second lead in their Nova.

Perrott and Williams narrowed the time gap and the challenge from Jones and James was thwarted when they went off the track.

With conditions drying slightly, Perrott changed tyres to have a push going into the closing stages but unfortunately hit a rock on stage 11 and knocked the wheel into the arch causing retirement from second place.

Davies and Lasper kept the pace on all day in the Dennis Motorsport and Ian Evans Motorsport 1600 Nova and, despite some damage caused when he caught another car on a merge section, ran without issue and led throughout, eventually winning by 70 seconds.

Ian Evans and Steve Small and Dan Evans and Jessica Hockly hoped for a double achievement, but Ian's Nova suffered engine failure on stage three.

That left the Ian Evans Motorsport honours to the Suzuki Swift driver.

Dan made a wrong tyre selection to start and was trying too hard initially but capitalised on the demise of Perrott resulting in second overall and a class win.

Herefordshire crews Gethin and Thomas Williams entered their Motorcraft MkII Escort and were lying in the top 15 before retiring.

Nigel Mee and Reg Davies piloted the Springfield Poultry 1600 Nova and had a lucky escape spinning between two rocks unscathed and finished first in class and 11th overall.

Luston driver James Young drove his 24 NRG Group Peugeot 306GTi and was navigated by Heather Phelps; following a steady start, improved throughout the rally and were overwhelmed to finish fifth overall and taking the class win.

Jordan Pilkington and Cameron Wheatly were in a Vauxhall Corsa and got caught behind slower cars on the merged section.

Then on the penultimate stage the duo hit a rock that caused a puncture.

They managed to finish fourth in class, and13th overall.

Justin Pounder and Rhys Edwards had an enjoyable rally in their Escort MkII thoug nad finished 18th overall.

There were several junior competitors co-driving, including Hereford's Caitlin Pugh who joined father Kevin in the Fiat Stilo Abarth.

Despite a gearbox scare, the family team sadly incurred a time penalty, although Caitlin thoroughly enjoyed the experience to finish 26th overall.

Meanwhile, father and son team Julian and Marcus Gore from Kingsland drove their recently acquired two-litre Sunbeam and were pleased not to hit anything during the day, resulting in 31st overall.

Graham Davies and Gary Powell retired their Sunbeam halfway through the event, while Steve Davies and Lucy Wilding were side-lined in their Clio with driveshaft failure.