BAY Scrapheap Challengers are 'gutted' after losing out on a TV final because of an engine blowout.

Paignton firefighter Alan Gilson, Wellswood plumber Simon Crimp and shopkeeper Andy Lang from Shiphay lost out on the next round of the Channel 4 show when the engine on their scrap-made motorised super surfboard blew up.

Up until then the trio, calling themselves The Beach Bums, had been well in the lead against two other teams in the first straight drag race.

Andy, who owns the Sign Shop in Torre, said: "The first team made it in about one minute 10 seconds, the second team made about 45 seconds and we totally blew them away and won the race with a time of around 16 seconds.

"If it had not blown up we would have won it by a massive margin.

"I was really disappointed. I'm not going to say it's OK. It's not. We were all absolutely gutted because it cost us the chance of going through to the next round."

The trio battled to repair the engine using scraps of wood, wadding and sealant.

But it soon became clear that the repairs would not hold.

Andy said: "I first thought that there is no way of winning now, but because the other teams were so bad, I thought we may be in with a chance, but sadly not."

Andy enjoyed watching the show being screened on Sunday with fellow team mate Simon.

"It was great," he said. "They picked out the funnier bits and it was good to watch it back.

"I have had lots of messages from people today saying bad luck. I haven't done a stroke of work all day."

See a video of the motorised surfboard in action on our website: thisissouthdevon.co.uk