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RALLY NEWS
NO.10 Service/Millstreet/Sunday 11.30
UNOFFICIAL LEADERBOARD AFTER STAGE 10
1st (2) Andrew Nesbitt/James O'Brien (Subaru WRC) 1.36.11
2nd (4) Frank Meagher/Dermot O'Gorman (Focus WRC) 1.36.51
3rd (1) Ian Greer/Dean Beckett (Corolla WRC) 1.37.51
4th (3) Austin McHale/Joe Downey (Corolla WRC) 1.39.07
5th (5) Kenny McKinstry/Sean Mullally (Subaru WRC) 1.39.58
6th (14) Niall McShea/Michael Orr (Saxo) 1.41.38
7th (24) Roy White/Des Cooney (Lancer N) 1.44.26
8th (10) Sean McArdle/Paul McCann (Celica) 1.47.19
9th (35) Nigel Hickland/Sam McMullan(LancerN) 1.48.32
10th (27) Liam Davis/Billy Kelleher (Lancer N) 1.49.32
MODIFIEDS
1st (67) Sean Gallagher/Liam Costello (Es.Cos) 1.45.22
2nd (18) Eugene Donnelly/Paul Nagle (Escort G3) 1.46.08
3rd (39) Greg McCormack/Sean Magee (Escort) 1.46.09
4th (32) Tim O'Riordan/Don Montgomery(Sierra) 1.49.51
5th (33) Kieran O'Neill/Diarmuid Falvey(Kad.) 1.50.10
Andrew Nesbitt put another seal of authority on this Cork 20
Rally through stage 10, Dromree, when he recorded a time 8s faster
than Frank Meagher and 18 quicker than Ian Greer. Nesbitt
said "It was a tricky stage, many different surfaces, it
was wet at the start then it dried out, then it got wet again,
and towards the end we were driving on marbles. It was a real
tester". Andrew has stuck with slick racing Pirellis
on his Cross Refrigeration backed Subaru, and it seems to have
worked really well for him. Frank Meagher has watched the
overnight gap between himself and leader grow from 25s to 40s
in 2 stages, and said "I was never going to go mad, but
in that stage we had a bit of a spin at the hairpin, and eased
back slightly thinking I had a puncture. It was OK, but the time
wasn't great". Frank went on to say that the Focus
is really hard to get off the start line of the stage, and also
feels the gearbox has gone a little notchy". McHale
is pulling his hair out with frustration at the handling of his
Corolla and is starting to think that both the handling and the
clutch problem may be directly related to the centre differential
not working properly. He said "Its like driving a
bad 2 wheel drive car, its wandering everywhere even down the
straights".
Kenny McKinstry told us "We had the perfect tyre for the
first stage today but it wasn't so good on the second, I was
off the road on both the tight corners before the finish. I keep
going for the handbrake in this car,missing it and hitting the
gear lever, the knuckle on my right hand is all swollen from
banging the gear lever by mistake". Niall McShea set
a pretty stunning time through stage 10 and that was despite
his Saxo running out of brakes. Roy White continues to lead gpN
impressively, his time on that stage 10 well on the pace despite
his Lancer having been up and down a bank at the end. His
closest gpN rival overnight was Liam Davis but his Lancer is
giving rear differential problems, and Nigel Hickland has slipped
into 2nd in the showroom category. In the Modifieds Eugene Donnelly
set the pace through 10, 16s faster than Gallagher. More to follow..BRIAN
& LIZ PATTERSON |
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