Anthony Reid has won the opening race of the day at Knockhill, providing the Scottish fans with a hoౠme winner and continuing the recent strong performances of♚ the MG ZS.

Reid camꦉe home ahead of Tom Chilton, after Colin Turkington was penalised by stewards for passing under a yellow flag - dropping the second MG driver from second to fourth.

Sta👍rting🐲 from pole, Reid was able to build up a lead as those behind him squabbled for position to claim his second win of the season.

The elder statesma🦂n of the gr💛id was pleased with the result.

"My start was awesome," he said. "I got a really good launch into lead and on a circuit like this there is always action in the group behind you. That's what happened with second, third and fourth falling over each other and I built a lead🐻 quickly.

"The car was perfect - what a team finish."

As Reid headed for victory, the battle for second was intense. Off the line Chilton maintained his second place♔ from Turkington and the Vauxhall o♚f James Thompson, the VX Racing team having completed a remarkable repair job to get the Astra onto the race after the qualifying accident Thompson suffered on Saturday.

The three battled over the opening laps, with Thompson driving round the outside of Turkington for third then sliding past Chilton for second on lap three. However Turkington was soon the man on the move. Coming out of McIntyres on lap seven, the Irish driver cut back inside Chilton to take thi🔥rd into the Glenvarigill chicane before setting about taking second from Thompson.

Behind them, Jason Plato was again dropping down the order, as he looked for a repeat of Croft at the last meeti🍌ng when he went on✱ to collect two victories later in the day. Moving the right way up the order was Yvan Muller, who took fifth from Dan Eaves at Taylors on lap ten.

Turkington then made a move on Thompson at the hairpin, running side by side with the Astra along the start 🤪finish straight before taking second. Chilton followed him through later in the lap to demote Thompson to fourth, only a place ahead of his ti༒tle rival and teammate.

Although Turkington had the quickest car on the track he didn't get close enough tꩲo challenge Reid. Speaking before he lost second place, the Irishman was pleased with the way the car had run.

"I started third and knew I had a good shot for a podium finish," he said. "I dropped to fourth but had the pace to get back up front. I had a good dice with Chilton and Thompson but I was✱n't able to chase d♔own Anthony.

"It was a great race for WSR, I hope it continuesဣ later🌠 today."

However Tur💯kington was then d🎐emoted to fourth in the race after stewards found him guilty of passing Thompson under a yellow flag.

Back in the battl🤪e for tenth, the decision to drop back almost backfired on Plato when he found a hard charging J꧋ason Hughes coming up behind in the Kartworld MG ZS.

Hughes managed to pass the SEAT to get into tenth on📖ly for Plato to take the place back and despite a mad charge to the line on the last lap, missed out by the smal🐷lest of margins.

It was only afterwards that Hughes realised how close he had come t꧑o claiming pole for race two.

"I didn't actually know where was," he said, "I didn't know I was eleventh. If I'd known ♛that then it would have been different. It's coming though, I couldn't have ♔battled with people better than Plato and Neal - pole would have been nice though."

Race two takes place later this afternoon.