RALLY NEWS NO.6 Saturday 4.15

UNOFFICIAL LEADERBOARD AFTER STAGE 8 Ballypatrick
1st (6) Sean Devine/Damien Duffy (Impreza WRC) 37.35
2nd (2) Raymond Johnson/Richard Bell (Impreza WRC) 37.58
3rd (1) Craig & Rodger Bennett (Focus WRC) 38.10
4th (3) Kieran Shaw/Crawford Henderson (Lancer WRC) 38.35
5th (23) Trevor Moore/Glenn Campbell (Escort) 38.38
6th (9) John McGlaughlin/David McElroy (Lancer N) 38.45
7th (8) Neil McCance/Sean Ferris (Lancer N) 38.58
8th (17) John Donnelly/Oran Donnelly (Escort WRC) 39.17
9th (10) Martin Elliott/Brian Crawford (Lancer N) 39.21
10th (22) Mark Barnett/Jonathan Charleston (Escort) 39.49

On stage 7, the short sharp Beaghs test, 3 drivers tied for fastest – Raymond Johnson, Kieran Shaw and Sean Devine. They all stopped the clocks on 1m22s. Craig Bennett was 2s slower. On stage 8 Sean Devine was out on his own, fastest with a time of 6.15. Raymond Johnson in a similar Impreza WRc was on 6.19 and Craig Bennett (Focus WRC0 and Kieran Shaw (Lancer WRC) tied with a time of 6.23. So with just 2 stages remaining Sean Devine is looking ever stronger, while Raymond Johnson has carved a pretty clear niche for himself in 2nd place and Craig Bennett, having been so close to taking the lead at the lunch halt, is now a relatively distant 3rd.

Having said all that, anything can happen over the last 2 stages. We were a little puzzled as to just why Craig Bennett dropped so much time on stage 6 after service. Craig himself thought he had gone well, but when whenever the whole thing was looked at it would appear that Bennett’s Focus is under geared, its flat out at 110mph and on all the long straights in Slieveanorra he was just losing buckets of time to rally leader Devine, whose Impreza WRC was pulling 219kph over Slieveanorra’s daunting crests.

Sean Devine was happy enough at the end of the Ballypatrick test, reporting no worries with his car. Raymond Johnson was also in top form, pleased to be back on the pace and reckoned a lot of it was to do with fitting new soft compound tyres for the afternoon stages. Not so happy was Kieran Shaw. He looked as if he was going to make a charge for the lead and indeed moved up from equal 5th to 4th place, but now his Lancer differentials have developed a mind of their own, going quite haywire at times in the stages, and the dash board digital read outs are lighting up in a real Guy Fawkes day display!

In Group N John McGlaughlin is now setting the pace, John much happier with the handling of his Lancer since this morning’s escapade. Neil McCance is continuing to drive a very accomplished steady rally, very much intent on getting the car to the finish to secure the NI Group N Champion’s title. Peter McCullagh was making a great charge, equal fastest gpN through stage 6, fastest gpN through stage 7, 1m up on McGlaughlin, but then it all went wrong on stage 8 and his Lancer has ended up in the bog. Apparently, according to Alistair Cochrane, when he was coming down in his Escort he could see the Lancer in the distance sitting off the road and thought “what a strange place”. It was after a 2 left 2 right but it didn’t look difficult. Then suddenly his Escort was completely sideways and nearly going off the road as well. Alistair can only attribute the drama to the way the loose gravel has banked up on the road, throwing the car sideways. It certainly felt completely different from the earlier run over.

In the race for the best Mk2 Escort Trevor Moore is still the pace setter but Mark Barnett wasn’t so far off Trevor’s pace through stage, just 2s slower. Andy Magee had a slow time through Ballypatrick, dropping almost 2m to his closest rivals following an excursion. Alistair Cochrane had a decent run and he is on a total of 40.18 just outside the leaderboard while Andy Magee is on 41.28. Bob Riddles finished stage 6 with the back bumper hanging off his blue Escort and then he went off the road at the end of stage 7, losing some time and causing a bit of a furore into the bargain. John Donnelly’s misfire in his Escort WRC isn’t getting any better. John reckons it is perhaps the lack of volts, that the battery is losing its oomph. When he switches things like demisters and heaters etc. the voltage drops. The car needs at least 12.2 volts to run the electronic ignition. Anything below that and the misfire starts. More news later. BRIAN & LIZ PATTERSON www.rallynews.net (with thanks to Michael Patterson)