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UNOFFICIAL
LEADERBOARD AFTER STAGE 8 - LAST STAGE
1st (3) Paul Harris/Eugene O'Donnell (Impreza)1.09.50
2nd (5) Michael Barrable/MJ Morrissey (Celica)1.10.17
3rd (6) Pete Doughty/Tim Sturla (Escort WRC) 1.10.54
4th(12) Tommy Graham/Anthony Nestor (Escort WRC)1.12.05
5th(14) Patrick Elliott/Martin Cahill (Lancer N)1.12.06
6th (10) Frank & Emily O'Mahony (Impreza) 1.12.53
7th (15) Roy White/Des Cooney (Lancer N) 1.13.22
8th (67) Kieran Molloy/Brian Boland (Lancer N) 1.14.07
9th (17) Jon Tainton/Aled Davies (Lancer N) 1.14.24
10th (20) Ollie O'Donovan/David Moynihan (Ford) 1.14.49
It was a nail biting finish to this Fastnet Rally with Paul Harris
17s slower than Michael Barrable through stage 7, Carron Lake,
but on the final stage, Glandore, the Donegal man pulled out
all the stops to beat his closest rival by 15s and win the rally
by 27. For Paul this is the end of a long hard year's battle.He
becomes the very worthy winner of the Dunlop National Championship.
Co-driven by Eugene O'Donnell throughout, Paul had some brilliant
victories in all parts of the country, and some heart breaking
mechanical breakdowns as well. It has all come good today.
Paul only needed to finish in the top 15 to beat Niall Maguire
for the title, but he has done the business in style, taking
victory on this final round. The 32 year old Letterkenny
man commented at the end of the final stage "It was hard
today, really tough through the floods. But it has been an unbelievably
brilliant championship. I am very pleased for all the team".
Co-driver Eugene said "We gave it a big cut on that last
stage. The car cut out and stopped at the windmills on stage
7 and we thought it was all over".
Last minute stories included...Wesley Patterson crashing out
of the rally on stage 7 when holding 4th place. Ray Breen
stopped just before the end, we hear reports that his Subaru
turbo gave up the ghost. Donie O'Sullivan pulled out at
last service, having no visibility through his Escort Cosworth's
screen.
Roy White takes 2nd in gpN, Kieran Molloy 3rd, Jon Tainton 4th,
all in Lancers. Patrick Elliott takes the overall GpN award of
course, to cap a superb Dunlop Cahmpionship GpN winning year.
Ollie O'Donovan came through brilliantly after his RS2000 stopped
for almost 2 minutes in a stage 3 flood to win F2. Stuart Darcy
had another class winin his GpN Civic, just 2 seconds behind
James Ann Foley in their class winning GpA Civic. The Foleys
were 15th, Darcy 16th. Killybegs man Darcy has an unprecedented
10 class wins out of 10 in the Dunlop series. Michael Barrable
commented at the end "It was a tough day, I got a bit tired
for the last stage, if we hadn't been off the road in stage 1
it might have been a different result, but then that's all ifs
and buts". Third placed Pete Doughty said "We
had very low turbo boost nearly all of the rally. In places it
didn't matter conditions were so slippy, but we could have done
with a bit more power on the last 2 stages". Finally
for now well done to Donnacha Hayes and all at the Club...especially
the marshals who stood out in such atrocious weather - it was
amazing that the rally kept going at times..well done to all...our
thanks to those who helped with the RallyNews service..and
special thanks to Martin Walsh. BRIAN AND LIZ PATTERSON. |
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