RALLY NEWS NO.5 St Angelo Service/Saturday
2.30
UNOFFICIAL LEADERBOARD AFTER STAGE 4 Fermanagh
1st (4) Gareth MacHale/Paul Nagle (Focus WRC)
54.51.8
2nd (5) Eugene Donnelly/Paul Kiely (Corolla WRC)
55.29.7
3rd (7) Eamonn Boland/Francis Regan (Focus WRC)
55.46.5
4th (2) Chris Atkinson/Glenn Macneall (Impreza N)
57.17.9
5th (6) Kenny McKinstry/James O'Brien (Impreza
WRC) 57.31.8
6th (11) Patrick Elliott/Paul Goodman (Impreza
WRC) 58.27.5
7th (25) Michael Curran/Fabian McShane (Lancer N)
58.49.0
8th (1) Daniel Carlsson/Jonas Andersson
(Mitsubishi WRC) 59.16.8
9th (17) Aaron MacHale/Ger McMonagle (Corolla WRC)
1.00.22.8
10th (22) Shaun Gallagher/Charlie McGinty (Lancer
N) 1.00.50.8
Eugene Donnelly turned in a scintillating time through stage
4, Fermanagh, and was 10s faster than Gareth MacHale with Eamonn
Boland a further 4s behind that and Swedish driver Daniel Carlsson 4th
fastest, another 3s in arrears. Best of the rest was Australian
Chris Atkinson in his GpN Subaru, 5th fastest overall.
Donnelly commented at stage finish. “We had a good run, that was a
smoother stage, flowing, and the car worked very well. Not
effortless but more comfortable which was down to the terrain.
Gareth MacHale said. “I think we might have been a little too
cautious, pushing hard where the road was clean but maybe not hard
enough in some places. The car was good and the tyres are perfect,
really everything is 100 per cent”. Daniel Carlsson said. “We went
medium well, it is difficult to find the bumps and jumps in the
notes, the stage is so fast in some places. It is hard to keep up
with the reading of the notes. We put in some extra bumps. Eamonn
Boland in 3rd continues his excellent run, but really
Eamonn is a man of few stories, his general comment holding good for
this rally – “not a bother”.
Chris Atkinson commented. “The car felt really good, there
was some very fast bits in the stage, we were on intermediate tyres
and I think slick would be better, same as Carlsson”. Kenny
McKinstry continues to hold 5th but admitted to a poor
enough stage time when he went walkabout at a junction, a couple of
hundred yards up an escape road. Says that he waved to his wife
Maggie, and the next thin g he was at a junction with tape
everywhere, couldn’t see arrows…a bit of a blonde moment for Kenny!
Patrick Elliott in 6th place ran wide at a T
junction left and plonked his Subaru wheels over a piece of
protruding kerbing. This damaged the wheels and there is some noise
from one of the hubs, but at least he escaped a puncture. Ray Breen
hit something around about the same place and a tyre on his Focus
WRC deflated. He stopped on a hill to try and change it and then had
to roll the car back down the hill and all in all lost a massive 9
minutes. Breen was sitting very nicely in 6th place but
that has sort of knocked that on the head, although he is still 13th.
Paddy White had a good run through the stage, particularly
considering he hasn’t done a recce, but he was right on the pace.
Kevin Barrett made too safe a tyre choice and dropped a few seconds
but is still sitting just outside the top 10 in the Triton Showers
Subaru. David James also had a good run and he is shown as 12th
overall from the early times, although David’s co driver Derek
Brannigan has taken a pain in his side and arm and he’s not feeling
very well, which is having a detrimental effect on the stage times.
In Group N the overall leader is still Atkinson in the
Subaru with Michael Curran 2nd. Michael remembered to
switch his Lancer diffs on for stage 4 and set a really good time.
Shaun Gallagher is 2nd group N in his Lancer but is still
worried about the front differential & clutch, the car is zigzagging
even on straight roads. Garry Jennings is still trying to make up
the 2 minutes road penalty he got following his transmission change,
and had a spin in stage 4 at a farmyard, the car starting to slide
way between trees so Garry spun it into a gateway and he says the
farmer “nearly s..t himself”. John McGlaughlin was knocking on the
door of the top 10 in his gpN Lancer, but he arrived into service
very late having lost a lot of time in stage 4. He knew his Lancer’s
brakes were leaking fluid and he was being very careful, but got
caught out on a square right and the car went over a stone wall and
got stuck for a good 5 minutes. Brian O’Mahony (Puma) is having a
great dice with Darren Gass in his Fiesta – both have been having
their fair share of problems. Brian had an overshoot at a square
right in stage 3, then his Puma developed front damper trouble and
he was off the road at another square corner in stage 4. Darren has
deranged the rear suspension of his Fiesta several times and the
wheels are all out of line but he is still battling on.
More news later. BRIAN & LIZ PATTERSON
www.rallynews.net
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