Jon Armstrong remains at the top of the Junior World Rally Championship standings despite a suffering a series of set backs on his way to fourth overall on the second round in Croatia.

Jon suffered three punctures, a fuel leak and an accident, but still managed to cling on to joint top spot in the series thanks to five fastest stage times and the demise of several of his rivals in treacherous conditions.

“As bad events go, it was probably not a bad result in the end up,” Jon acknowledged.

“It was eventful from the word go, and it was quite good for the championship that we had so many issues and still are joint leaders. Okay maybe we got a bit lucky, but we were quite unlucky throughout the whole weekend too. It’s not so bad.”

Jon went into the rally knowing a repeat of his victory in Croatia the previous year would give him a commanding lead in the series after taking the win on the first round in Sweden, but from the first stage he hit problems.

In foggy and slippery conditions he quickly caught a succession of slower cars, and the time lost getting past them left him eight seconds adrift of the early JWRC leader.

He quickly rectified the early time loss when he posted a second stage time 34 seconds quicker than anyone else, but stage three saw him collect his first puncture costing him another quickest time.

He was back at the top of the timesheets on stage four and held a convincing 25 seconds overall lead at the first service halt, but things started to unravel on stage five.

“With it being so wet, rocks were getting exposed with all the cuts and you had to go into the cuts and hope for the best,” explained Jon.

“On the first stage after the midday service we got a puncture and had to stop and change it. That put us out of the lead, and then we had a puncture on the next stage as well and had to stop again.”

The puncture problems left him three minutes off the pace of the leaders, but worse was to follow on stage seven when his day ended stuck in the undergrowth.

“It was tricky conditions with the mud, and it was quite a fast corner,” recalled Jon.

“The rear of the car got away and I couldn’t catch it. It half spun and then hit a tree on my side and got stuck, so that was the end of the day.”

With hopes of outright victory gone Jon was able to re-join under Super Rally rules for day two with the aim of securing some fastest stage times which would benefit his championship score.

He duly delivered a fastest time on the day’s opener, but a fuel leak on the road section before stage nine ended his day prematurely once again. “There was smoke coming into the car,” he revealed.

“After the stage we were trying to find the issue, and under the bonnet we could see there was fuel leaking and we had no way to rectify it, so it was safer to not continue for the rest of the day. That was a shame because we probably missed out winning a few stages that day and could have got a few more points.”

The Kesh driver, with Fermanagh’s Brian Hoy calling the pace notes, returned for another go on day three, and he finally managed to piece together a relatively trouble free run. He notched up two more stage wins and benefitted from the retirement of last year’s champion Pajari to claim fourth overall.

Jon’s next outing is in a Rally 4 car in the Canaries, before he returns to JWRC action for Rally Portugal from May 19-22.

“I did Portugal last year and had good pace on the Friday and was leading, but got a puncture,” recalled Jon.

“I think Portugal is a case of trying to be consistent and trying to stay out of trouble. We will have to see how that goes. It is one thing being fast, but you have to stay away from any big trouble or dramas.”