The British Rallycross Championship in association with Odyssey Batteries headed the short hop just over the English Channel to Duivelsberg Circuit in Maasmechelen, Belgium for the long awaited round 5 of the 2016 campaign.

Tunbridge Wells based Graham Rumsey was looking to continue winning form after his success at the last round in Wales.

The event was unusually run over a day and a half with free practice and qualifying 1 being ran on Saturday afternoon with the remainder of the qualifiers and the finals taking place on the Sunday.

The promise of an exciting weekends racing was not to disappoint. The weather was to play its part with temperature’s firmly in the late 20’s and very dusty conditions.

Couple this with the fact that the circuit was a new one for Rumsey so nothing was assured. The Kent driver picked up where he left off in Wales and in qualifying 1 and notched up the second fastest time just a second behind the fastest time.

Q2 saw Rumsey take heavy contact and failed to finish the race, after some truly epic work by the XtremeRX team he was back on the grid for Q3. However, another heavy hit saw him bring the car home in 4th place.

This left Rumsey at the back of the grid for the final with everything to drive for. A fantastic start saw Rumsey up to second place after the first corner, where he would sit trying every trick in the book to gain first place.

It was on the penultimate lap that he seized his chance when the leaders bonnet catches gave out. Rumsey then drove flawlessly to take the checkered flag and in the process solidify his second place in the championship just four points behind the leader.

Round 6 of the championship now returns for its second visit to the spiritual home of Rallycross, and Rumsey’s home circuit of Lydden Hill in Kent held over the 29th August on the Bank Holiday.

Speaking at the end of the trip abroad, Rumsey was pleased with his work and is now looking forward to driving back in Kent:

“Really happy with the result. It was hard work with the accident in heat 2 and heavy contact in heat 3, but thanks to XtremeRX. We were there at the final and achieved a great win.”

“I’m really looking forward to Lydden Hill in August”

Picture supplied by Matt Bristow.