Josh McErlean delivered a career-best performance on the World Rally Championship Vodafone Rally Portugal by claiming second in WRC2

Co-driven by James Fulton, Josh challenged strongly for the class victory over the final two days of the three-day event, with the lead swapping back and forth several times before, ending the event in second spot, just three seconds down after 337 kilometres of intense competition.

The Motorsport Rally Academy duo were piloting a Toksport World Rally Team Skoda Motorsport Fabia RS Rally2 for the first time and quickly got to grips with their new mount, setting a string of ultra-competitive times over the challenging gravel stages of the Porto region of Portugal.

McErlean who was in contention all weekend went for it on Sunday morning and regained the lead with just two stages left to run. Entering the penultimate test, just 0.1 in front of Solans from Spain. Solans went 6.5 seconds faster on the second last stage leaving McErlean with a mountain to climb over final test. McErlean went fastest by 2.9 seconds meaning Solans took the win by 3.2 seconds after a total of nearly four hours of rallying.

Fellow Academy athletes and 2023 Junior World Rally champions William Creighton and Liam Regan who stepped up to WRC2 in an M-Sport Fiesta Rally2 for 2024 also competed in Portugal and were running competitively in the top ten in WRC2 before a broken suspension component forced them to retire on Friday afternoon.