Paul Taylor ended his Snetterton Bank Holiday weekend happy enough with a race win in the Volkswagen Racing Cup - his first of the season - but perhaps rueing that he missed out on what could easily have been a double victory celebration.

Taylor, the 2006 champion, was romping home to certain victory in the first race of the day - pre-race showers having made the track slippery and an ideal hunting ground for his four-wheel-drive Golf R32 - when he was ordered to the pits to serve a drive-through penalty for not observing the track limits at Sear corner.

It was a bitter pill for the Hertfordshire man to swallow; Taylor had taken control of the race from the outset, rocketing into the lead off the line, past pole-sitter Didge Dziurzynski’s Golf and the Beetle of championship leader Steve Chaplin. Taylor was on a wet-tyres-all-round set-up, but both Didge and Steve had opted for slick rubber on the front wheels.

Chaplin struggled the most with his tyre choice, slithering down the order as the race progressed and suffering a spin at Sear, as well as a clash with another car which dropped him to sixth by the end. Dziurzynski seemed to care little that he had not made the best tyre choice: he simply drove around the problem, allowing Taylor to get only 5s in front and setting fastest lap in pursuit.

On lap 12, when Taylor was called to serve his penalty, Didge gave up his spot to the Golf GTI of Peter Felix, which was fully shod with wet tyres. “There was no way I could live with Peter’s pace,” he said. “But it was an awesome race for me, even though I was on the wrong tyres.”

Felix had seen the penalty flags waving at Taylor: “I saw the penalty being issued so I knew that if I could get past Didge it would be for the lead.” So it proved and Felix went on to take his third win of the year by a 1.6s margin over Dziurzynski, with James Walker’s KPM Racing Golf third and Taylor slotting back into fourth.

SEAT MD Peter Wyhinny got past both Chaplin and Aaron Mason on the 13th lap to secure an excellent fifth for his Leon Cupra, with Mike Kurton’s Slidesports Scirocco following Chaplin home for seventh. Slicks on the front did not help Daniel Walker’s progress early on and led to a couple of spins, but he battled back towards the end to eighth.

The Comline/AWM Golfs of Mason and Tim Snaylam finished in line astern for ninth and 10th, with Kieran Griffin returning from a footballing injury to pilot his Scirocco to 11th, ahead of Michael McInerney’s Europcar Jetta, the Caddy van of Simon Elliott, which survived unscathed a fourth-lap spin at the Esses, and the Team Fuchs Golf of Phil Morris.

Taylor made amends for his drive-through penalty in the first race with a dominant performance during a restarted round 10 to secure his first victory of the 2010 season.

At the original start, pole man Chaplin got away well, but rarely is anyone a match for Taylor’s four-wheel-drive R32 Golf off the grid and the championship frontrunner powered through from third on the grid once again to lead around the outside at Riches.

Further behind, Elliott got out of shape in the Caddy with a resulting spin taking him across the track into the path of the following train of cars. Luckily there was no major contact; a delay to all was the only inconvenience.

Taylor scorched into a lead of almost two seconds on the opening lap but his advantage was negated soon after when the safety car was deployed due to a major shunt involving Wyhinny’s SEAT and Dziurzynski’s Golf. They tangled on the run past the pits and contact with the barriers on the inside was unfortunately inevitable. With debris on the track and damage to the Armco, officials had little option but to red flag the race.

Lining up for the restart with the same grid order, minus Dziurzynski and Wyhinny, Taylor again stormed to the front and although Chaplin gamely tried to challenge into Riches the R32 held the lead. Felix, meanwhile, slotted into third in his Golf ahead of the similar machine of James Walker - the latter’s car sporting a heavily taped-up bonnet after contact in the original race.

Building a crushing advantage of almost two seconds over the first 1.95 miles of racing, Taylor aimed to extend his lead further into lap two but a three-car accident at Sear on the opening tour meant the safety car was deployed once more. McInerney’s Jetta, Snaylam’s Golf and Griffin’s Scirocco all came to grief.

The restart came on lap seven and Taylor immediately pulled clear of Chaplin and the rest, running unchallenged to the chequered flag to win by 2.7 seconds. Chaplin was usurped by Felix at the Esses as racing resumed and at the finish on lap 10 they were separated by just 0.4 seconds.

Fourth place went the way of Daniel Walker after sibling James and fellow Golf runner Mason made contact at the last corner of the last lap. Mason attempted to go around the outside of James into the chicane but the late move didn’t pay off and both cars collided. Mason recovered to take fifth behind Daniel, with the latter’s brother crawling across the line 10th. Kurton rounded out the top six in his Scirocco, ahead of Martyn Walsh’s Golf, Tony Harberman’s Beetle and the Caddy Van of Elliott.

Morris placed 11th, his best finish of the year, ahead of Simon Andrews and a Joker-playing Zoe Wenham, who was sampling Golf power for the first time.

Reflecting on his first win of 2010, Taylor said: “There were plenty of incidents out there and I was fairly lucky at the restart as I had clear track ahead of me on the grid with Peter (Wyhinny) not there. I made the jump, got a good lead and then when the safety car came out I backed them all up, got away well and finished the job. It’s nice to end the weekend like this, I’m delighted.”

The Volkswagen Racing Cup with Fuchs Lubricants is additionally supported by Augustus Martin, Ceva Logistics, ECM Vehicle Delivery, Hankook, Milltek Sport, KW Automotive, Superchips and Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles.