Craig Rahill takes fourth place in Junior ERC category

From twenty-sixth of the ERC contenders after SS1 Armstrong made it into ninth after SS3 but then plummeted when he went off the road on SS4 and lost over a minute.

Cavan's Craig Rahill (Peogeot 208 Rally4) was fourth in the RC4 category of Rally Sierra Morena, the first round of the European Junior Rally Championship in Cordoba. File picture: Martin Walsh

Following the demise of Kesh driver Jon Armstrong from Rally Sierra Morena (Cordoba) the opening round of the European Rally Championship, it was left to Billy Coleman award winner Cavan's Craig Rahill (Peugeot 208 Rally4) to uphold Irish honour as the twenty-one year old finished a creditable fourth in the Junior ERC category.

After losing 14.6s to ERC pacesetter Nikolay Gryazin on Friday's short opening stage when he stalled his M-Sport run Ford Fiesta Rally2, Armstrong topped the time sheets on Saturday's opening 6.7km stage. "It was a lot slippier than I was expecting, I was trying to drive clean lines like a racing style. To be faster than Nikolay (Gryazin) is good."