ROGER ALBERT CLARK HISTORIC ASPHALT RALLY CHAMPIONSHIP

Press release: Monday June 22, 2026

DAVIES TOPS HISTORIC ASPHALT CHAMPIONSHIP IN ARGYLL

• Historic Asphalt Championship heads to Dunoon
• Stefan Davies takes third championship victory
• Category 4 win for Will Onions and Dave Williams in their BMW M3

Round five of six in the new Roger Albert Clark Historic Asphalt Rally Championship was the Dunoon Presents Argyll Rally on June 19-20.

The closed-road event, based in the town of Dunoon, covered 16 special stages and around 70 competitive miles on the challenging roads of the Cowal Peninsula in south-west Scotland, and was the penultimate round in this year's inaugural Historic Asphalt Rally Championship.

When the action opened with two short special stages through the town centre of Dunoon on Friday evening, the stage was set for another battle between Stefan Davies/Michael Gilbey and Will Rowlands/Emyr Hall in their Ford Escort Mk2s. However, on the very next stage at Tarsan Dam, it started going wrong for Rowlands when he hit a straw bale at a chicane and damaged the steering. They made some quick repairs and battled on, but two stages later the Escort slid off the road and was beached with a damaged exhaust, so their rally was over.

That left Davies ahead as Friday night concluded, and he then had a full day of competition on Saturday to measure his pace and make certain of another maximum score. He did just that to bring to bring the car safely home for his third victory from five rounds in the championship.

Leading the chase and finishing around a minute and a half behind were Iwan Jones and Nigel Roberts in their Escort Mk2 after an excellent run on this challenging event. Behind them in Category 3 came Graham Muter and Mark Mason in their Escort to wrap up the category finishers.

Category 1 was always going to be about the Mini Cooper S of Shane Gamble and Julia Perry and they had a good run on this tough event to take maximum category points once again. 

Meanwhile, in Category 2 another classic Mini, albeit the slightly later model of Andrew O'Hanlon and Kevin Hogan finished ahead to take maximum points. One of the few retirements from the Historic Asphalt Championship contenders was the Hillman Avenger of Ian Robertson and Andrew Scott, who battled mightily until mid-morning on Saturday when the Avenger was sidelined with an engine fire. Thankfully, the fire was extinguished before too much damage could be done, but their rally was over.

Category 4 was won convincingly by Will Onions and David Williams in their BMW M3 and they finished only seven seconds down on the Escort Mk2 of Jones and Roberts after a strong run on their first experience of this event.

Finally, runners up in Category 4 were husband and wife team Paul Clayton and Veera Johnson in their Peugeot 205 GTi. They are big fans of the Argyll event and managed to get the Peugeot around, despite inflicting some minor panel damage after a close moment with a telegraph pole. They were elated with their result, which keeps them in the running for the Category 4 title within the championship.

The Historic Asphalt Rally Championship will now conclude on the Hills Ford Stages in Shropshire on September 19-20.

Event results are available here:

https://www.rallies.info/res?e=698

More information will be posted on the championship Facebook page:

www.facebook.com/RACRMCrallychampionship

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Paul Lawrence