Craig Rainer made a perfect start to the new Ford Saloon Car Championship at Brands Hatch.

The defending champion took class B and overall honours with an excellent drive.

Rainer, from Crawley Down, was facing stiff opposition and, with the biggest grid of the day, qualifying among the 26 entrants was tough.

The Wealden Racing team man soon got into his stride and qualified in pole position for the first time in his career.

A good start saw Rainer lead into Paddock Bend with a number of class A cars and class B rivals in hot pursuit.

However, Rainer soon began to pull away and, helped by a clash between two class B cars which took both out of the race, he held his position to the chequered flag to win by ten seconds.

Rainer, who is next in action at Angelsey on April 12-14, also collected the Driver of the Day award.

Brighton's Mike Webb was competing in the second round of the Hot Hatch Championship at Donington Park.

In the first round at Mallory Park, Webb suffered two drive shafts breaking and bearings packing up.

The drive shaft problem affected him in qualifying again but he still managed to end up 19th on the grid out of 33.

When the race got under way, Webb was up to tenth place when an incident forced the red flags to come out. The restart saw him get another good start and a tremendous tussle followed with four cars challenging for seventh place.

Webb, in his first season in the championship, eventually finished ninth overall and seventh in class A.

He said: "I was very pleased, as were the pit crew. I'm sure by the next visit to Donington we will have ironed out a few problems and mistakes by me, so let's hope for a higher scoring finish."

Champagne corks were popping this week at Monza Sport, the Alfa Romeo specialists based in Cowfold, after proprietor Bryn Griffiths steered their new Alfa 156 Sportwagon Turbo Diesel to two second places in the opening rounds of the Le Mans Auto Italia Championship at Brands Hatch.

On the challenging Kent circuit, the finely tuned Alfa 156 performed beyond expectations.

Griffiths said: "We had little time for testing so the two podium finishes were unexpected but the car handled superbly and I can't wait for the next meeting at Castle Combe."

Griffiths has won the championship for the last two seasons. He said: "We never thought that we would be in a position to repeat the previous year's successes but on the first outing this car has shown such tremendous speed that we hope it will take the chequered flag on Easter Monday at Castle Combe."

BIKE rider Tommy Hill finished a tremendous second in his first outing in the Virgin Mobile Yamaha R6 Cup at Silverstone.

Hill, from Lingfield near East Grinstead, put in an impressive ride in the R6 Cup, a support race to British Superbike Championship.

All of the competitors are given identical machines to race - the Yamaha R6 600cc - and have a full back-up team. The winner of the championship will be rewarded with a full ride within the British Superbike Championship in 2004 for the Virgin Mobile Yamaha squad.

Hill qualified 11th but came into his own in the race, dicing for the lead before eventually finishing second.