Romford's Matt Luff kept his hopes alive in the Milltek Civic Cup with a solid display in the penultimate round at Brands Hatch last weekend.
He now sits in second place in the championship standings, nine points behind series leader Alistair Camp, with another driver just two points behind him in third ahead of the final round at Snetterton later this month.
Luff qualified in second place for race one at Brands and set a new lap record for Civics at 53.261, which makes him the holder of most lap records in the series with three after his success at Castle Combe last month and Snetterton last season.
And he held onto his position for the entirety of race one, before starting race two in ninth place on a reversed grid.
Luff had moved up to fourth after just four laps, before an accident saw the safety car deployed for the majority of the race and a squeeze by another driver knocked the steering out.
"The second race was frustrating as with so much of it under safety car Matt just didn't have time to gain more places," said mum Lynn.
"Matt was pretty confident he would've been able to get past Camp, which would've helped with points."
Defending champion Camp leads the way with 236 points, from Luff (227) and Morgan Bailey (225) going into the last two races of the season.
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