27 April 2025 / By our Rally Reporter
Dumfries driver David Bogie and Irish co-driver John Rowan (above, centre) retained the McDonald and Munro Speyside Stages Rally trophy after an impressive first run in their Skoda Fabia RS.
With the Snowman Rally cancelled earlier this year, due to a lack of available forest miles, the Speyside took on the mantle of the opening event of the 2025 Scottish Rally Championship. Clerk of the Course Neil Shanks and the team from 63 Car Club did a fantastic job of lifting the curtain with a superb event.
After a first stage where the top three were locked at 43 seconds, Bogie and Rowan eked out an eight-second advantage over reigning Scottish champion Euan Thorburn, with Paul Beaton on notes, and claimed another eight seconds in the fifth stage.
Thorburn won the seventh in his Polo R5 by two seconds to set up an exciting final stage, but then suffered brake problems on the final stage which forced him to back off. Bogie went on to win the Ben Aigan stage convincingly in 6.48 – clocking 37 minutes dead for all eight stages to claim his 12th win in 17 Speyside events – while Muir of Ord driver Scott MacBeth and Elgin co-driver Daniel Forsyth also took advantage of Thorburn’s brake issues to come through into second spot in their Fabia R5 for a Skoda 1-2, and a Pirelli 1-2-3.
Dougal Brown and navigator Lewis Rochford won the G&M Mechanical Services 2-wheel-drive category, in their red Mk2, and there was a stunning success in the Autoshop.co.uk MG3 Rally Challenge.