COUNTY racers were among the stars who featured in the Jock Taylor Memorial Trophy race meeting at East Fortune race circuit at the weekend.

The event is held annually in memory of the only Scottish FIM World Sidecar Champion, who hailed from Pencaitland and was tragically killed in an accident while racing in Finland in 1982. Talented East Lothian teenagers Paul McClung and Lewis Rollo showed their potential at the meeting, with several dominant performances in a packed field over the two days of racing, with both now leading the adult Scottish Championship Road Racing classes.

Haddington's 17-year-old McClung continued his sensational season in the 600 Superstock class by winning all four of his races, while in the Scottish Lightweights' class, Rollo, 14, from Gifford, also took four race wins, performing like a veteran.

In the Scottish Superbike series, the current championship leader, Perth's Torquil Paterson, didn't have it all his own way following the return of Andrew Tasker, who had been out of action for several weeks following a bad crash at Croft.

Paterson won both of Saturday's Superbike races and Tasker won the Sunday races. Paterson left the circuit still leading the Scottish Superbike Championship.

Tranent's Superbike racer Bryan Campbell came away from East Fortune having achieved his best performance so far this season, a third place, and he is gradually heading upwards in the championship table.

The Jock Taylor memorial race itself took place on Sunday afternoon and was preceded by a parade lap, led by Taylor's sidecar, which has been rebuilt by Jack Muldoon, who has also taken it to the Isle of Man for a lap of the TT circuit.

Fife's Scott Lawrie and his passenger James Neave, from Lincolnshire, entered the weekend as the holders of the trophy and were determined to put in a special performance to try and keep it in Scotland, where the team are based.

They qualified on pole but the first running of the race was red-flagged on the second lap.

A relatively undamaged sidecar was removed and the race re-started as an eight-lap contest with no warm-up.

Lawrie and Neave were quickest away and stayed in front for the whole of the race.

The duo stormed to a comprehensive victory and were first to cross the finishing line, 23.14 seconds, ahead of Haddington's David Wrinn and passenger Karl Schofield, who put in a determined effort to try and bring the trophy back to the county.

Wrinn and Schofield finished second in all four sidecar races, all of which were won by Lawrie and Neave, who are currently sitting third in the FIM World Sidecar Championship.

The winner of the Tom Dickie Memorial award, which is voted for by the marshals, was newcomer Bethany Polanski from Cardenden, who only started racing this season and rode four good races over the weekend.

Senior Post Classics racer Martin Harrison, of North Berwick, picked up two decisive wins, a second place and a did not finish, while Haddington's Mark Leonard, another of those impressing, managed a third place in the Pre-Injection class.

The next meeting at East Fortune will be over the weekend of August 18-19.