Ford And Its Winning Focus Stay Out In Front

The Ford Focus - Britain's top-selling car - has outsold its nearest rival by over 50 per cent. Buoyed by the launch of the acclaimed turbocharged 2.5-litre Ford Focus ST, the model topped 17,500 sales this year so far. The second-placed car was more than 6,000 sales behind.

Ford took a car market share of 16.7 per cent, both last month and year-to-date according to latest figures from the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT). This was 1.5 percentage points up on February 2005 and the corresponding volume - 12,660 Ford cars sold last month - was eight per cent higher than the previous year.

Other Ford highlights include:

• Ford Fiesta secures 22 per cent of the year's small car sales
• Twice as many Ford Kas registered as closest segment competitor
• Ford Focus also diesel best seller
• Ford Mondeo remains favourite large car
• Ford Galaxy is number one large Multi Purpose Vehicle (MPV)
• Volumes of market leading Ford Transit are up eight per cent

From March the first Ford Focus Flexi Fuel Vehicles (FFVs) delivered to customers will feature among Ford registrations. The Ford Focus FFV is the country's first biofuel car and Avon and Somerset police will be driving on bioethanol from later this month. The FFV runs on bioethanol or petrol in any mix in the same fuel tank. A 1.8-litre Ford Focus FFV costs £14,095 with no premium charged for its flexi fuel technology.

Roelant de Waard, Ford of Britain chairman and managing director, said: "Ford Focus - the nation's favourite - and Ford Fiesta are leading the charge and helping to maintain our position as top car and commercial vehicle brand. Customers are the only true judges of our success, so I was particularly delighted that Fiesta and Focus were first and second respectively in the retail top 10 - reflecting private buyers' car purchases so far in 2006."