RALLY NEWS NO.8 Service – Sunday morning – 09.30

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UNOFFICIAL LEADERBOARD AFTER STAGE 9 (revised – overnight)

1^st (13) Tapio Laukkanen/Harri Kaapro (Impreza WRC) 1.03.13.0

2^nd (2) Eugene Donnelly/Paul Kiely (Corolla WRC) 1.03.26.3

3^rd (1) Austin MacHale/Brian Murphy (Focus WRC) 1.03.50.3

4^th (3) Derek McGarrity/Dermot O'Gorman (Impreza WRC) 1.04.33.2

5^th (4) Eamonn Boland/Damien Morrissey (Impreza WRC) 1.04.46.6

6^th (9) Tim McNulty/Julian Nangle (Impreza WRC) 1.05.41.6

7^th (8) Donie O'Sullivan/Paul Nagle (Focus WRC) 1.06.01.0

8^th (23) James Foley/Lisa Roe (Lancer N) 1.06.52.6

9^th (15) Roy White/Greg Shinnors (Lancer N) 1.06.53.7

10^th (12) Denis Cronin/Helen O'Sullivan (Celica) 1.07.53.8

11^th (16) Aaron MacHale/Ger McMonagle (Lancer N) 1.07.55.8

12^th (25) Dessie Keenan/Laura Keenan (Lancer N) 1.08.00.0

The results changed overnight because stage 4 was removed from the list. This was down to earlier timing difficulties. This increases Tapio’s advantage to 13s – it was stage 4 where Tapio had his spin and hit the bank. Another major change is that James Foley gets ahead of Roy White in the race for overall Group N honours.

There is still a long way to go on this First Choice Flooring Galway International Rally. Interestingly, Eugene Donnelly had a small engine sensor problem on the way in from stage 9 to the Galway parc ferme. This morning Tapio Laukkanen was having a good gaze under his Impreza bonnet on the way out to the first service.

Just outside the top 12 we have Colm Murphy in 13^th in his gpN Impreza. Then Tom Holton in 14^th: George Cullen in 15^th. George is driving the ex Bertie Fisher Impreza for the first time and found the suspension to stiff to start off, but has gradually been softening the car off. Tony Davies is 16^th, his Metro 6R4 lucky to escape an overshoot through posts and up an escape road on the last Saturday stage. 17^th is Jack Sleator in his GpN Lancer, 18^th John Spain, the highest placed Galway driver, his Celica surviving a broken drive shaft yesterday. 19t^h is Glenn Wilson and that was despite power steering problems in his Escort F2. 20^th is Guy Woodcock in a similar Escort Max to Glenn Wilson’s. Guy’s car suffering form a sticking clutch all through Saturday.

Some of the overnight class leaders include Ollie O’Reilly in his Escort G3. Aidan Bourke in his Civic. Padraic Price in his Escort G3. Stephen Bird in the Mk2 Escort. Tomas O’Rourke in his Astra. Patrick Kearney in his Peugeot. Peter Leahy in a Sunbeam. Frank Twomey in his Swift. Eamonn Lee in his Sunbeam. Harry Cathcart in his Suzuki Swift. Frank Cunningham leads the Historics from Mervyn Johnston, both in Mini Coopers.

More news on Tapio Laukkanen – his Subaru was pushed into this first service with a dead engine. It looks like Tapio could have a 1 minute penalty which equates to 15s stage penalty. The engine still isn’t going. If the penalty is applied this will put Eugene Donnelly into the lead..... for now.  STOP PRESS… John Sjpain has had to push his Celica into service, broken clutch. More news later. BRIAN AND LIZ PATTERSON