The triple Northern Ireland champion set fastest times on every stage as he finally got to put his new S12B Subaru through its paces.

He's owned the car for more than two months but it was only yesterday that he was able to enjoy some real stage mileage in it following a couple of early hiccups including a third stage crash on the Rally of the Lakes.

But fresh from a re-build at Subaru's Prodrive base, Lynch powered the Impreza to a 66-second victory over another three-times Northern Ireland champion, Kenny McKinstry, on the ALMC event.

McKinstry's Subaru finished a further half-minute ahead of the Toyota Celica of Mark Courtney.

Originally third place had been a close battle between the Group N Mitsubishi Lancers of Colm Murphy and Damien Tourish but both of them hit trouble towards the end, Murphy retiring and Tourish dropping back to finish fifth. The Donegal driver still took the production category honours as well as maximum points in the Irish Mitsubishi Evo Challenge series.

Meanwhile, Lisburn's Wesley Patterson topped the times in the Loughgall Motorsport Festival in his Ford Escort, seeing off the challenge of Kris Meeke who was also driving an Escort on the charity event. Meeke had been hampered in the early part of the rally challenge by a misfire but hung on to take second ahead of Camillus Bradley.

Fastest in the historic category was one of Meeke's sponsors, Keith McIvor in a Porsche, but on handicap top place was shared by John Keatley (Porsche) and Colin McDowell (Mini Cooper).