Garry Pearson and Hannah McKillop triumph in Borders Competitions Jim Clark Reivers Rally

Borders rally crew Garry Pearson and Hannah McKillop are now seriously considering an assault on the Scottish Rally Championship title after achieving a life’s dream and winning the Borders Competitions Jim Clark Reivers Rally at the weekend.

In a field of 116 crews from across the UK, and as far afield as Iceland and New Zealand, Pearson found himself in another local battle on Sunday with fellow Duns man Euan Thorburn - the Reivers’ champion in each of the past three years. Pearson, guided by McKillop, the Northern Irish co-driver who lives in the Borders, led from the front with four stage wins, but Thorburn claimed three and kept on his tail right until the final mile of the event.

In that final stage, he was reducing the seven-second gap on Pearson as he went for broke, but, ultimately, he suffered a puncture just a mile from the end and his attempt to catch Pearson was over.

There was no hiding the delight on the face of Pearson and McKillop as they were crowned Reivers winners for the first time, and with it Scottish Rally Championship (SRC) event winners too.

“This is definitely a bucket list moment,” said the 34-year-old driver. “You can probably tell from the ear-to-ear smile how I’m feeling.

“That was a very tense battle with Euan, and credit to him, he pushed me all the way, and we couldn’t let up at all. So, yeah, absolutely over the moon. Euan doesn’t rally much these days but he’s won it three times in a row because he’s very quick on these roads, so it’s good to finally to take this crown off him, and we’ll try and keep it.”

Having now competed in two British Rally Championship (BRC) and two SRC events, sitting fourth in the BRC standings, and now contesting the lead in the SRC - which he won in 2021 - he added: “We have a bit of thinking to do on which one we focus on because it’s tough to do both right the way through the year.

“I am thinking about going for the Scottish Championship now because that’s us won the two events we’ve competed in [Border Counties and Jim Clark], but at the same time I would really love to contest the British because I’ve never won that, so we’ll take some time to savour this and then we’ll sit down and work it out.”

Both Pearson and Thorburn had already gone toe-to-toe in the British Jim Clark event, which runs through Friday night and Saturday, where Pearson finished fifth and Thorburn sixth overall, just 22 seconds between them after nearly 100 miles of rallying.

That produced another first-time winner in young Scot Max McRae and Cameron Fair in their Pirelli-shod Skoda Fabia - watched by Max’s father Alister, who had flown in from Perth, Australia, and grandfather Jimmy, both of whom are former British Rally champions.

After winning the last round of last year’s British Championship, McRae and Fair suffered a puncture in the first round this year, the Seven Valley Stages, which dropped them to fourth. But they served notice of their speed after winning the last eight of the ten stages on Borders roads to pip Welsh pair Meirion Evans and Dale Furness in a Pirelli 1-2. The Scots are now just three points behind Osian Pryce and James Morgan, who finished third in Duns.

McRae admitted: “I am just delighted to win. This was my fourth time [at the Jim Clark], though on the first one the car broke 100 metres into the first stage, so it is nice to come back and everything just go perfect.

“The ‘Jim Clark’ is such a difficult rally to win because you have a lot of great teams, such high speed and massive commitment from beginning to end. And it means a lot to me to win because this is a well-known rally with a lot of history.

“The last six months have been pretty rapid, since we got into the new car, and I think it’s still a lot more to come as well, which is a good thing.”

And his secret to winning the rally? “Drive as fast as you can and hope when to get to the end that it’s faster than everyone else!”