A Keighley youngster is revving up for success in the world of model stock-car racing.

Jonathon Holden, who lives with his parents David and Anne in Woodworth Grove, Ingrow, is the youngest registered driver in the British Radio Car Association. He has also been voted the best junior driver in 1998 by the Yorkshire Model Stock Car Club.

Using a one-eighth-scale model car that once belonged to former World and European model racing champion Dave Clark, and based on stock car racer Phil Smith's car, Jonathon is hoping to emulate their success.

The eight-year-old, who attends St Mary's School, Riddlesden, got the bug from his dad and only started racing in April last year. He races at the Michelin Sports and Social Club at Burnley where regulars soon christened him the 'zig-zag racing team' because he could not drive in a straight line.

Now Jonathon is proving to be a top-class driver managing around 41 laps of the usual 45 per race. He also races at tracks in Skegness, Leicester, and Coventry.

Mum Anne says that he is also becoming a bit of a mechanical whizz with the model cars. "The petrol-driven cars are checked for weight and other measurements before every race and he has to know how to put the car together," she says.

Racers are graded. Beginners start with a white-top car before progressing to yellow, then blue, and top-class drivers go on to red tops. They are re-graded after every tenth race.

Now a yellow top, Jonathon - who has a brother William, 13, who also races, and a sister Abigail, six - hopes to eventually become a world champion.

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