West End's Jon Barnes missed out on the national Caterham Supergraduate Championship by just three hundredths of a

second in the Caterham Festival at Brands Hatch.

The teenager, having his first season in the championship after a successful career in karting, knew he had to beat his big rival Simon Lambert to take the title.

And the two of them had a titanic struggle in the final round of the series with Lambert crossing the line fractionally before the Hampshire youngster. "There must have been just millimetres in it at the end," groaned Jon's

father Dave.

Barnes had qualified on pole with a stunning series of laps to take the top spot by three tenths of a second. Indeed at one point he had the four fastest laps of the session. But by the end of qualifying it was Lambert who crept up to fill the other slot alongside Barnes on the front row.

The young Hampshire driver went to Brands knowing that a win would secure the title. What he did not know was that it

would be a battle that would go right down to the last second of the race.

In the race Lambert got a flying start and opened up a three-car gap going into the daunting Paddock Hill Bend. But Barnes got his car up behind Lambert less than two corners later and began harrying Lambert going into the second lap.

The leading pair gradually pulled out a gap from the chasing pack and from then on it was obvious that there was going to be just the two cars in the race to the chequered flag.

On the third lap Barnes took the outside line going into Druids and drove completely around Lambert, then defended into Graham Hill Bend to take the lead.

Across the start/finish line Lambert drew up alongside and going into the fast Paddock Bend tried to out-brake Barnes, but not to be outdone the local driver left braking to the last possible moment. Lambert misjudged and briefly collided with Barnes in a shower of bodywork, the two looked as though they would go off the circuit, but good skills from both kept the race alive.

Lambert tried every which way to get around Barnes who always seemed to have the superior technique and proved to be very quick around the bottom part of the circuit. But on lap 12 Lambert out-paced the teenager down the straight and was resolute in his defence.

Then, heading for the flag on the last lap, Barnes got into the tow of Lambert and edged himself through the narrowest of gaps between the leading car and the pit wall. It looked as though a win was on the cards but he just lost out by millimetres on the line.

Barnes, dejected at finishing second by such a small margin, thanked his parents and sponsors Technart Printing and Howard Smith Paper for their backing during the season.