A rally karting business near York is on the verge of being wiped out by thieves who stole all six of its uninsured vehicles.

Timo and Joyanne with their one remaining kart, which was sold by the thieves to an unsuspecting buyer Picture: Garry Atkinson

Three times Isle of Man rally champion Timo Kennish, and his fiancee and business partner, Joyanne Ball, started up Pulse Racing at Tockwith Airfield last September.

Now they are desperate to find the eight-horsepower rally karts, worth £3,000 each.

From his home in Skeldergate, York, Timo today appealed to the criminals: "Give yourselves up and return them. You cannot know how badly you've put our business and our personal future happiness in jeopardy."

Even as Finnish-born Timo was proposing marriage to Joyanne at her parents' home over Christmas, thieves were using steel cutters to smash their way into a 24ft-long shipping container in which the vehicles were stored.

While one of the vehicles was later recovered in a battered state - tracked by police to a house in Leeds - the couple, both aged 32, have learned no charges were brought against the householder who innocently bought it.

But Timo wants Leeds police investigators urgently to track down the rest of the karts, which have Honda engines and are bigger and more robust than ordinary go-karts.

He said: "Time is of the essence. So far I have had to turn away around £1,500 worth of business from groups of adults seeking rally kart sessions because I have nothing to offer them.

"Then there is the £190 it cost me to bring the recovered vehicle out of police storage, plus the cost of mending its battered frame. We can't go on like this."

Also in the melting pot because of the thieves are their hopes of buying a house at Home-on-Spalding-Moor. "We wanted to use its four acres of ground to move Pulse Racing out of the Tockwith Motor Centre, where because there was no electricity for security lighting, insurance companies wouldn't cover us for theft.

"Now we are going to have to think hard about those plans."

The couple discovered the theft when they returned for a booking on December 30. Timo said: "Someone knew exactly where it was and came equipped to smash a substantial lock and cut through a thick metal shell. We are devastated."

Joyanne said: "We were shattered. The business was beginning to go so well and when Timo proposed we had such hopes for the future - now this."

PC Norman Waller, of Boroughbridge police, said that when the rally kart came to light in Leeds an investigation was launched by Leeds police. He said: "No charges were brought while further inquiries were made to back up the claims that it was an innocent purchase.

"There is now an ongoing investigation to establish the source of the purchase of the machines, a line of inquiry which is being pursued by Leeds on our behalf."

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.