David Higgins continued his domination of the opening round of the 2004 Kwik Fit Pirelli British Rally Championship on stage 3, despite claiming that he'd "Lost his Rhythm". Officially titled the Richard Burns Rally Stage but more familiar to Kielder regulars as the Bower, the very dusty 11 miler saw Higgins heading Jonny Milner by just 5 seconds with Paul Bird the best of the rest, despite struggling in Barry Johnson's dust, ahead of Alistair Ginley, Mathew Wilson, who felt his notes needed tweeking and Steve Perez whose Focus had developed a tendency to oversteer.

Simon Redhead was delighted to get a clear run at last, his lights failed on the opening stage and he was delayed by a puncture on the following one. Olly Marshall struggled through the stage, his Clio running on three cylinders and he was keeping his fingers crossed that he would make it to Parc Ferme at Hexham, as were Stuart Jones/ Andy Marchbank whose Proton Satria was wandering all over the road.

Sebastian Lings lead in the Production class had grown to over a minute ahead of Dorian Rees who now had Neil Buckley les than three seconds behind him, with Rob Swann catching up despite being baulked in the stage. Broccoli continued to lead the Super 1600's from Clark but only by 10 seconds, from Teiskonen, Gareth Jones and Jonnie Wigmore while Roca eased out a few more seconds at the head of the Stilo brigade.