TOM Cave and James Morgan in the New Generation Hyundai i20 R5 once again proved their potential to win a Prestone MSA British Rally Championship round, when they led the RSAC Scottish Rally during the early stages of the event.

Having driven a perfectly judged first leg, they accrued a 9.9-second advantage on the Friday, only to retire on Saturday when the car lost a wheel on stage three.

Following their front-running pace in their first outing in the car on last month’s Carlisle-based Pirelli Rally, it was confirmed Cave would drive a New Generation i20 R5 on the third round of the series.

The Scottish Rally started in Dumfries, and featured a service park based near Lockerbie and finished in Moffat. The route comprised a total of 75 competitive miles split into 10 stages, over gravel roads in the Ae and Eskdalemuir Forests.

The competition began with two stages on the Friday evening and just as they had done on the previous Pirelli Rally, Cave and Morgan were quickest out of the blocks, with the fastest time through stage one - an 8.8-mile run in wet conditions.

They headed into stage two - a re-run of the first - with a 4.5 second lead and, even with the road surface rougher, they were fastest again, and extended their lead to 9.9 seconds, before the overnight halt.

With everything going according to plan and the car handling perfectly on its DMACK tyres over the unpredictable road surface, the strategy for the first of the eight stages on Saturday was to continue to push and extend their advantage.

Split times in SS3 showed they were faster than their rivals by a handful of seconds as they got closer to the end of the nine-mile stage. But then, when negotiating a left-hander, Cave felt what he thought was a right-rear puncture.

It soon became apparent that the car had lost a wheel and, although continuing to the end of the stage, their rally was over

“It’s such a shame, as everything was going perfectly and exactly as planned up to that point”, said the Aberdyfi ace.

“The car felt great and I am confident that we could have maintained our pace.

“Even though we didn’t finish, we take away a lot of positives from this event.

“It’s certainly quite reassuring to know that every time we’ve completed a stage in the Hyundai, we’ve won it! I therefore hope to be driving the car again soon.”