Jürgenson, reigning junior world champion, and his co-driver Siim Oja saw off their closest rival, the 2022 junior world champion William Creighton, by 14.4 seconds at the short, five-stage rally, while the rest of the pack trailed by more than a minute.

The 25-year-old native of Paide has been in the U.K. a lot this year, as he is currently based at M-Sport Ford headquarters, at Dovenby Hall in Cockermouth, on the Cumbrian coast, and the small-town environment seems to have suited him.

"I've come to realize that Estonians and the English are quite similar in many ways ... The humor is similar—we poke fun at each other," he noted, adding he appreciated the region's natural beauty too.

At the same time, his race win may serve to raise his profile – which didn't seem to be the highest pre-race in Kielder, as his Ford Fiesta Rally2 didn't have an onboard camera installed as would normally be the case with favorites, Postimees reported.

Jürgenson won four of the five gravel stages at Kielder Castle on a course which straddles the Scotland–England border.

He is next in action at the full WRC event in the Canary Islands starting next Thursday.

Jürgenson's career began in 2022, when he won the FIA Rally Star program, a global talent search which used a video game competition to discover new rally drivers, Rally Journal reported.

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