Family rivalry will just have to wait for Fife racer

Sandy Galbraith has been off the track for a decade but will return to race in the stock rods - the same category as his son.

The father and son should be going head to head, but the sport has been put on hold until government guidance can allow it to return.

And Scott can’t wait.

He said: “I was looking forward to my second year in the Stock Rods, especially as my dad, Sandy was going to be racing against me.

“My dad has been away from racing for ten years and decided half way through last season he was going to return.”

Despite the competitive rivalry they’ll have, Scott credits his dad with getting him into the sport - attending his first stock car meeting when he was just two weeks old!

“At that time my dad raced along with Kenny and then Jimmy Pitcaithly,” he said.

“Racing was in my blood and I was sure that at one time or another I would join them on the track.”

After graduating from the ministox, Scott was immediately attracted to the stock rods after watching his dad race them and pick up a fair degree of success.

He bought his car just before the start of the 2019 season and got off to a flying start, winning his first race.

“It was very wet and I started from the front of the grid and won it,” said Scott.

“I was second in heat two and the final.

“I had been apprehensive about driving in the wet but had got to grips with the conditions quickly. I loved it and have been very competitive in wet and greasy conditions since.

“I was quite lucky that I had another couple of meetings from the white grade but at the end of the grading period I had scored sufficient points that I had to start from the red grade.

“Of all the luck my first meeting from the red grade just happened to be the European Championship.

“I had a mixed bag of results in the qualifying heats which meant that I had to start from the fifth row on the outside of the grid.”

The Europeans didn’t go well and the car developed a misfire which in the end saw Scott having to retire half way through the final.

The World Final wasn’t much longer in coming around but again the car he was using started to misfire.

“Once the misfire had been sorted I was happy with how the car ran,” added Scott.

“My next big test was not that far away – the Scottish Championship.

“I drew pole position which made me happy and when the race did start I got away well and quickly built up a good lead. The top names were chasing me but then there were an incident and out came the yellow flags. We all slowed and came to a stop on the back straight. I had Michael Bethune, Lee McGill and Stuart McKinnon right behind me. Made a good restart to race but I lost the lead but then saw a gap on the inside and went for it. The gap closed and I bounced off a marker tyre and out of the race.”

“I felt that I had raced well and my confidence was high as a result. I had raced hard against the top drivers and led them for a while.”

“Over the remainder of the season I did relatively well and was in the top ten track points scorers which I thought was good for my first season.”