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Bogie impresses team with “magnificent” ERC debut

David Bogie suffered a nightmare start to his FIA European Rally Championship debut on the Circuit of Ireland but ended it with a top-six finish, a share of the €20,000 prize money and praise from his team boss.

Bogie, a former British champion and five-time Scottish champion, had been forced to miss Thursday's Qualifying Stage after damage incurred in a spin in Free Practice, but he completed the event and was pleased with sixth overall and a slice of the prize money awarded to the top seven finishers on each event that register for the ERC and use MICHELIN or Pirelli tyres.

He said: "We registered for the ERC so we could do Qualifying and get a good starting position, but we spun in Free Practice and couldn't do Qualifying because we'd damaged the radiator. But despite having to run further back than we'd hoped, we focused on the job in hand and got on with it.

"We wanted to reach the finish, get some solid points on board and continue to learn about the ŠKODA Fabia R5 and the Pirelli tyres - and we certainly achieved all of those things during what were two days of very difficult rallying conditions."

For all his success in Britain, Bogie is no veteran on asphalt and in a car that was relatively new to him, he impressed the head of his CA1 Sport team Martin Wilkinson, who hailed his result as a "magnificent achievement".

Zdroj: fiaerc.com