DARTS ace Chris Quantock maintained his impressive recent form with victory in the latest round of the Streamline Taxis York Open Darts Championships.

Quantock, who will be playing in next month's Coral UK Open on ITV4, beat Mark 'Nitro' Lawrence 5-4 in the final of the fourth ranking event last weekend at Huntington WMC in York.

Now in its seventh year, the York Open involves 12 ranking events which are staged every fortnight between January 7 and July 1.

Players collect ranking points based on their performances at each event in addition to prize money for reaching the last eight.

The top 48 players at the end of the ranking stages qualify for the Grand Finals on August 5 along with the top eight ladies and the top four youth players (aged under 18).

Only last month, Quantock, 25, from Strensall, secured a place on the Professional Darts Corporation (PDC) Tour for the first time in his career after qualifying at the Q-School held at Wigan’s Robin Park Tennis Centre.

The former Huntington School pupil subsequently won an automatic passage to the last 64 of the Coral UK Open, which is known as the 'FA Cup of Darts', after finishing 26th in the Open’s order of merit during his first month on the tour. The event is being held at Butlins Minehead Resort between March 3-5.

In York last weekend, Quantock beat Lawrence (12-20-15-15) with legs of 21-17-19-15 and 16 darts with both players hitting one maximum.

He beat Justin Hobson 4-3 in the semi-final while Lawrence won 4-2 against event one winner Darren Johnson.

In the quarter-finals, Quantock hit two 180s and a 177 score in legs of 15-17-17 on his way to a 3-1 victory over Simon Cass.

Johnson beat Trevor Day 3-1, Lawrence beat Stuart Limbert 3-2, and Hobson whitewashed PDC Tour player Richie Corner.

There was a total of 32 maximums during the course of the event with Quantock hitting nine and both Limbert and Jaron Esteve scoring four. Jo Hodges was the only 180 scorer in the ladies event.

Quantock twice finished on 11 darts and Lawrence twice finished on 12 darts. Lawrence (161) took the £25 prize for the highest check-out.

Hodges won the furthest lady prize whilst Adam Pearce collected the furthest youth prize after a 9 dart throw off.

Lance Milburn and Mike Atkinson won the Blind Pairs beating Neil Ward and Andy Brayshaw in the final with Corner/Hodges and Mark Lea/ Limbert the beaten semi-finalists.

The next round of the Streamline Taxis York Open Darts Championship takes place on Saturday March 11 at Huntington WMC. Players must register by 12.30pm for a 1pm start.