Craig Breen, took his second successive European Rally Championship Circuit of Ireland victory with co-driver Scott Martin in the Lakeland Tyres backed and DGM Sport run Citroen DS3 R5.

"I think this win is a bit more special than last year even" said Craig. "It was tougher event, a bigger event, especially as the competition was so fierce, and even the unpredictable weather made it a real challenge." 

It was a dramatic event, especially on day two, when Craig's lead was whittled down to a nail-biting five seconds by Pole Kajetan Kajetanowicz in his Fiesta R5, with the similar machine of Fermanagh's Alastair Fisher never too far behind.

"The first day went really well" explained Craig." We went for an attack on the long thirty-one kilometre Glen's stage and that was just amazing. It was like rallying in Finland, but without the room on each side. The car was in the air so often at high speed, and you were setting it up for a corner knowing it was going to take to air. It was incredible, the best stage ever!"

The stage time too was incredible as the Lakeland Tyres Citroen now held a thirty-five second advantage before the Newtownards spectator stage, where their luck changed with a time consuming spin.

"It was very slippery in the town and that spin brought the gap back to twenty-five seconds. Then on day two we perhaps played it too safe on the tyre choice and the tyres were going off on that first loop. We were losing time, and to add to it we got a rear wheel puncture two miles from the end of the Hamilton's Folly stage. There was nothing I could do to avoid a rock that had been pulled out by a previous car. The road was covered in hail-stones, and there was one line and the rock was on it, but the time loss could have been worse, just seven seconds."

The Abu Dhabi Total World Rally Team driver then had to pull out all the stops in the afternoon to defend his Circuit of Ireland title.

"We went for the attack on the Bulls Brook stage. The start of the stage was dry and it suited our harder tyres, but then it started to get wet, very wet. There was nothing we could do. If we were going to win the Circuit of Ireland we had to push on regardless, and we dug deep taking five or six seconds off Kato. The final stage was Banbridge where I spun into the hedge last year, and my heart was in my mouth driving that stage, especially at that junction, even though it was running a different way. It went well though and I'm simply over-joyed to have my name on that trophy once again. There are a lot of people I have to thank, but there is no doubt that without the support, enthusiasm and momentum to start the event from Lakeland Tyres it would not
have been possible. It was great to have Eugene Donnelly on board also, as he has so much knowledge and experience of Irish rallying it really helped
at the weekend."