THIRTEEN-year-old Alex Quinn from Camelford has managed to win a prestigious ticket to the Rotax Max World Finals in Valencia, Spain.

A pupil at Sir James Smith's School and a driver with the Taunton based Coles Racing Team, the starlet came out of a battling weekend in second place and crowned runner-up in the International Open, held at the end of October in Spain.

This was the qualifying race for the coveted ticket to the World Final.

Qualifying gave Alex an initial mountain to climb, suffering from carburation jetting issues leaving him short of pace and ending up 18th on the grid for his three heats.

If anything, this setback spurred Alex on, taking a ninth, fifth and sixth place finishes in the heats showing a great turn of pace and race-craft. This left him starting the Pre-final from fourth. As good as this sounded, he was on the un-favoured outside of the grid for the infamous first corner.

For the full report, and a round-up of the area news and sport, see this week's edition of the Post.