Dempsey in dominant form

Morgan Dempsey Jnr was the fastest race winner at Phoenix Park yesterday averaging 86.34 m.p.h. in the Europa Challenge in which he scored a dominant win over Henry O'Friel and Leslie Wright, writes Brian Foley.

Jackie Cochrane won the two Historic races in his Sunbeam Tiger and for the second successive year Arnie Black won the Crossle Sports Car race. Alan Dawson won the race for Strykers, Ray Moore took the flag in the Formula Vee final and John Whelan won the RT 2000 from Dave and Brendan Donegan.

Finland's Marcus Gronholm won the Rally of Finland and grabbed the overall lead in the world championship in Jyvaskyla yesterday.

Gronholm, driving a Peugeot 206, came in over a minute up on the Ford Focus of Scotland's Colin McRae, with another Finn, Harri Rovanpera, in a Toyota Corolla, third.

Gronholm said: "It's great to win at last in Finland after so many years of trying. I'm relieved to have finally scored a home victory."

His task was made considerably easier by the early departure on Saturday of Britain's Richard Burns, whose Finnish mission came to an abrupt end when he crashed into a ditch.

Meanwhile Formula Three ace Takuma Sato turned on the style to beat Green Flag Championship leader Antonio Pizzonia in a frantic round 11 at Silverstone yesterday. Carlin Motorsport driver Sato was quickest in both qualifying sessions on Saturday. And he led from start to finish in the 30minute race round the sweltering Northamptonshire track's 2.249mile international circuit, in front of a season's best crowd of 12,500.

Pizzonia's runner-up spot gave him 15 priceless championship points, extending his lead over Tomas Scheckter to 35 points with only three races left.

As well as the 20-point haul for taking the chequered flag, Sato grabbed a bonus point for the fastest lap of one minute 16.453 seconds, slashing his championship standings gap to Scheckter to 22 points.