Craig Rainer began a new season of the Ford Saloon Car Championship as he means to go on by taking the first class win of the year.

Having ended 2001 badly, crashing out of four races before finishing the season prematurely with engine problems, the Crawley Down driver and his Wealden Racing team travelled to Brands Hatch with their highly modified class B Mk II Escort hoping for a good result to start the season.

Qualifying saw Rainer go out with more than 20 other Ford cars, ten of which were entered in class B, and times were better than last year, constantly down in the 54 seconds a lap range.

At the end of the session Rainer had qualified second in class and fourth overall, missing the first in class place by a mere .06 of a second.

Times for the qualifying were so close that it looked like it would be a hard fought race but when the pole position car had gearbox problems off the line and the pole for class B car ploughed into the back of it, Rainer took advantage.

He followed the class A Sierra of last year's champion Graham Waite into Paddock Hill Bend in second place and for the remainder of the race he held on to his place comfortably.

Rainer's class win was accompanied by the fastest lap for class B.

This was not the end of the day for the Sussex driver as he was also entered into the race for the South East Sports and Saloon Challenge.

This race was open to all classes of car, including ex-touring cars.

Entered in class B again, Rainer qualified first in class and third overall with only an Escort Cosworth and an ex-touring car Audi in front of him.

The race proved a challenge for Rainer but he eventually brought the car home first in class for the second time that day.

Brighton's Mike Webb was also competing in the Ford Saloon Car Challenge but his day ended in disappointment.

Webb was back in action with a rebuilt engine and things were going well as he qualified a respectable seventh overall and fifth in class.

A few tweaks were made to the suspension and set-up for the race, and Webb was soon in the thick of the action, climbing to sixth place.

Webb moved up to fifth but then began losing time and on lap nine a front tyre exploded at 120mph along the pit straight, which brought an early end to his race.

Webb said: "It was clear that the tyre problem had been the cause for my slower lap times in general, although I did match last year's time during the race."