COMEDIAN Rowan Atkinson last night denied that the curse of Mr Bean had returned to haunt him after he walked away unhurt from a high-speed motor racing smash.

In a scene reminiscent of the accident-prone TV character, the star crashed his Aston Martin on the first lap of a race at Croft Race Circuit, near Darlington.

The smash, which left Mr Atkinson shaken but uninjured, delayed the rest of the meeting as a recovery team had to lift his damaged sports car off the track.

His race, which was the seventh of the meeting, had to be restarted while the actor was checked by a doctor and his battered red Aston Martin V8 Zagato was taken away to be fixed.

As fans waited for the racing to begin again, race commentators cheekily labelled the bend he crashed on as "Atkinson Corner".

But despite having to watch the rest of the race trackside, the comedian - a keen motor sports enthusiast - refused to be too downbeat about his mishap.

He said: "I'm afraid I don't have a great news story for you - in fact it's a bit embarrassing as we've got some friends with us.

"It was the brakes I'm afraid, they just weren't responding. But at the end of the day it was just one of those things, at least I'm not injured.

"I don't think it was the curse of Mr Bean on this occasion - at least, I certainly hope not. The trouble is I'm not great at watching races, I'd rather be in them."

Yesterday's crash was the latest near disaster for the star, who was involved in a terrifying ordeal in a chartered private plane while on holiday in Kenya with his family, in March.

Atkinson had been flying from Mombasa to Nairobi when the pilot of the twin propelled Cessna passed out at 16,000ft.

As the plane lurched violently, he grabbed the controls until the pilot regained consciousness and landed the plane safely.

In 1999, he crashed a £650,000 MacLaren he bought to celebrate the film success of Bean, and walked away unhurt.