Despite winning the last round of the Toyota Sprint Series Championship outright, East Yorkshire rally driver Jonny Milner returned empty handed from Blyton Park last weekend.

Driving his Merlin International supported ‘Xtreme’ 700 BHP Toyota Celica GT4, the defending champion drove well, but he was narrowly beaten over the six round series by old adversary Adrian Smith.

Having won the MSA National Gravel Rally Championship convincingly last month, Milner was hopeful that he could repeat his success by retaining the Toyota Sprint Series Championship title too, although he knew that he had a tough fight on his hands.  Determined to regain the title in 2011, Milner commented; “This year’s Sprint Series has been a tough old scrap between me and Adrian all year and really could have gone either way.  It’s been great fun, though and I’ve learnt so much about how to develop and drive this type of car and we’ve both committed to come back and have another go next year.”

With only tenths of seconds between the two drivers all series, both will be looking to their cars to see what refinements they can make over the winter to gain the advantage to take the title.  Jonny said; “The Merlin Preparations team will strip the car down over the winter and see what we can do to gain valuable seconds over Adrian’s Toyota Celica GT4X.”

Merlin International was one of the associated sponsors of the 2010 Toyota Sprint Series and will be looking to expand its customer car and hire deals for the 2011 Series.