RALLY NEWS NO.7               End of last stage/Sunday 5.15

UNOFFICIAL LEADERBOARD AFTER STAGE 8 (LAST STAGE)

1^st (1) Kevin Lynch/Francis Regan (Impreza WRC) 43.48

2^nd (3) Gareth MacHale/Paul Nagle (Corolla WRC)  43.57

3^rd (4) John McCarthy/M Morrissey (Corolla WRC) 44.37

4^th (26) John McGlaughlin/David Moynihan (Lancer N) 46.34

5^th (27) Peter McCullagh/Alan Dolan (Lancer N) 46.35

6^th (10) Trevor Harding/Charlie Boland (Impreza) 46.37

7^th (23) Brian McGillen/David Doherty (Impreza N) 46.38

8^th (5) Kevin O'Kane/Martin Hanna (Impreza WRC) 47.11

9^th (20) Patrick Elliott/Mark Bowens (Lancer N) 47.55

10^th (31) James Coleman/Eoin O’Neill (Escort) 47.59

      (9) James Murphy/Anthony Nestor (Esc.Cos) 47.59

A couple of stages ago it looked as if Kevin Lynch was going to cruise to victory on this Moonraker Rally but when his Subaru collided with a deer on the penultimate stage, Coolatoor, all of a sudden Lynch was under pressure. Kevin, and co driver Francis Regan, kept it all together and did win, their Impreza WRC finishing 9s ahead of Gareth MacHale’s Corolla WRC.  It transpired that the collision had damaged Lynch’s Impreza intercooler and power steering, making the car very difficult to drive. Kevin said at the end. “It was a great rally, I don’t know if the deer enjoyed it unfortunately, but we had a good run apart from that. I had to push very hard through the last stage driving with no power steering”.  Gareth MacHale said “We gave it a real go at the end, tried very hard, I know I was on for maximum championship points, but it would be nice to win overall as well”.  Gareth and co driver Paul Nagle have now had 3 outright rally victories in the forestry championship, and today’s result makes it 4 maximum scores out of 4.  Kevin Lynch, who won the rally last year and is the current forestry champion, did not register for points today, as he is not contesting this series this year.   John McCarthy brought his Corolla WRC into 3^rd place and said. “It was a good day, it was a good rally. We’ve been trying these different tyres and we are getting them sorted out.  Fair credit to young MacHale, he drove well”. 

Behind the leading three there were some equally intense battles. Group n went right down to the wire with John McGlaughlin winning by just a second from Peter McCullagh, with Brian McGillen 3^rd, 3s in arrears.  McGlaughlin was trying to save his car for next week’s Sperrins event, while McGillen made a marvellous fight back after early turbo problems with his Lancer, and indeed could very well have won the category if it hadn’t been for a trip into a stage 8 ditch.  Brendan Kelly picked wrong tyres for the last 2 stages and finished just outside the leaderboard on 48.20. 

In the 2 wheel drive category Brian Lawlor was fastest in the early part of the day and was up as high as 4^th overall.  He looked as if he was going to repeat his brilliant result from Wicklow a couple of weeks ago, but he put his Escort off on a square left corner in stage 7.  He arrived just too fast and the car slid into a huge ditch.  The spectators helped to manhandle the car out and Brian reckons he was lucky to make the finish at all.  This left James Coleman to take the victory for 2 wheel drive.  He had a gear box changed by his engineer Gareth Lloyd after stage 6, the Welshman fitting a 4 speed box within the allotted time which was pretty good going.  Coleman finished 11s ahead of Frank Kelly’s similar Escort, the latter the talk of the spectators towards the end as he fought back after a stage 3 puncture.