RALLY NEWS NO.1 Charterhall
Service/Friday 7.30pm
UNOFFICIAL LEADERBOARD AFTER STAGE 1 Abbey St Bathans
1st (2) Mark Higgins/Bryan Thomas (Focus WRC)
12.25.2
2nd (6) Tim McNulty/Eugene O'Donnell (Impreza
WRC) 12.25.7
3rd (7) Eamonn Boland/Francis Regan (Impreza
WRC) 12.33.6
4th (3) Eugene Donnelly/Paul Kiely (Corolla WRC)
12.38.1
5th (5) Austin MacHale/Brian Murphy (Focus WRC)
12.53.5
6th (11) Barry Johnson/Stewart Merry (Impreza
WRC) 13.05.7
7th (9) Gareth MacHale/Paul Nagle (Corolla WRC)
13.07.8
8th (26) Philip Morrow/Glenn Patterson (Lancer
N) 13.18.7
9th (24) Ryan Champion/Craig Thorley (Lancer N)
13.20.5
10th (34) Nik Elsmore/Nigel Gardner (Lancer N)
13.31.0
11th (18) Garry Jennings/Rory Kennedy (Lancer
N) 13.31.9
12th (35) Neil McCance/Graham Hopewell (Lancer
N) 13.32.4
The opening stage of this Jim Clark Rally was always going
to be a tough one with lots of different types of surfaces, narrow
tight places, and fast bumpy places. Mark Higgins made the best
of it in his Focus WRC, but by just 0.5 of a second from Tim
McNulty. Higgins said before the start that he was trying a
completely different set up in the car from a few weeks ago when
he won the Manx National in it. The car seemed to be a lot lower.
Mark said about the roads “It was slippy in patches, we kept it
safe and had no problems.” Eugene Donnelly was 2nd on
the road, he was 13s down on Mark. Eugene had his fair share of
dramas just before the start. He put his Corolla WRC through a
wooden gate and smashed the Corolla windscreen. A replacement
couldn’t be found locally and he started the rally with a Perspex
replacement screen. He then found in the stage that the bright
sunshine made it very hard to see in places.
There were further dramas in the Donnelly camp. Eugene’s
brother Charlie who acts as Team Manager felt that the correct
tyres were not available for the conditions, and was on the verge
of withdrawing the Corolla from the rally completely, but Eugene
decided to keep going. When he finished that opening stage all he
would say about the handling of the car was that it was
“unsettled”.
Derek McGarrity’s Impreza suffered a puncture from 4 miles
into the 15.6 mile stage and he dropped a minute. Austin MacHale
was held up slightly behind McGarrity. Tim McNulty had a good run,
it is all starting to come together for him now in his Impreza WRC
S10.
Rory Galligan had a puncture on his Lancer, kept going and
dropped about a minute. Dougie Hall also had a puncture and lost
a lot of time. Stuart Jones is in head gasket trouble. Other
drivers having problems included – John Cope who has put his
Impreza WRC off the road for almost 2 minutes, and Richard Gower
hasn’t reached stage finish. Roy White’s Group N Lancer had a
front puncture for 5 miles and dropped half a minute.
More news later: BRIAN & LIZ PATTERSON (with thanks
to Ciara Conlon)
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