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| Cavan Stages Rally |
| RALLY NEWS No.1 - PreStart - Sunday @ 09:37:53 |
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RALLY NEWS NO.1 Kilmore Hotel HQ/Cavan/Sunday 09.30
Over the 26 years of this Cavan Rally Ballinode man Niall Maguire has won it four times, the 2nd most successful driver on the event, with only Andrew Nesbitt having won it more times. Today Niall bids to make it five but it won’t be easy. Clerk of the Course Marty Sherlock has laid out an extremely technical, challenging series of three stages, to be completed three times, before the champagne finish back at the Kilmore Hotel. Apart from the difficulty of the course, Kevin Barrett and Sean Devine in similar Subaru Impreza WRC’s to Niall’s will be doing their utmost to deny Maguire the honours. Niall and Kevin may be the best of friends, but there will be no quarter given when it comes to the special stage times. Kevin’s Triton Showers Impreza has been prepared to the last degree by the Kenny McKinstry team and Kevin has promised to give the rally a real good go. Sean Devine’s last big outing was winning the Rallye Sunseeker earlier this year and he will be anxious to get on the pace, both to try and win the rally and also as a warm-up for the Donegal Rally.
Speaking before the rally, Kevin Barrett told us, “We’re planning to give this is a real go as it is a non National Championship round. We’ll try to put it up to the boys here. Our Banbridge engineer has a new set up for us to try, suspension and differential settings, and this is the place to do it. The stages aren’t as bumpy as usual here, but the first one is very technical, it is into the narrow stuff right away, on cold tyres, so it will be tricky. The 2nd one is quite fast. I’m looking forward to it!” Kevin’s co-driver Sean Mullally was competing on the Jim Clark National Rally with Welshman Melvyn Evans and won that, so maybe that’s an omen for today!
Behind the trio of World Rally Cars at the front are the two leading GpN entries, John McGlaughlin and Neil McCance in their respective Mitsubishi Lancers. Both will be out to score maximum points in the Evo Challenge and judging by their recent battles, they will not only be battling for GpN but will be close to the overall pace. At No.7 was to be former Production World Rally Champion Niall McShea, and he had Corolla TC man Terence O’Shaughnessy co-driving. Niall’s run today was to be in aid of the Paul Gallagher Appeal, but it is not now happening as Niall’s Orion has not passed scrutiny. At No.8 is Raymond Conlon from Clones in his Corolla and at 9 Virginia’s Russell Woods in his Escort. These three spearhead the ultra competitive two wheel drive division. Liam Egan has made the trip all the way from New York to compete on the rally and he starts at 10 in his Lancer.
Liam is another who is out to score in the Evo Challenge and he currently leads the points in his Derek McGeehan prepared example. Indeed, although this Cavan Rally is on an opt out year from the National series, the plethora of other Championships represented today, including the Citroen Racing Trophy C2R2’s and the HASS Border Championship more than makes up the slack. Adrian McElhinney currently leads the Citroen Racing Trophy from Mark Kane with Sam Moffett 3rd. The last Citroen round in Monaghan produced all sorts of fireworks with Sam taking a hard earned victory. He only discovered after the rally that some wee cooling valve underneath a piston wasn’t working and a piston had got damaged. That is all now sorted, so no doubt he’ll be flat out here today. Eight Citroen C2R2’s have entered the rally but reportedly Paul Manton can’t make the start this time.
The Border Championship is class based, so there isn’t really a clear leader until near season’s end, but some of the driver’s looking good include Monaghan’s Anthony Hand, who runs his Escort in Class 10 and Daniel Conaghan, who has a series of class wins in his class 11 Escort. Interestingly, Niall Maguire is also in the running for the Border thanks to his class wins, disregarding overall results. There have been a few withdrawals from the published entry listed. Adrian McElvaney, Eugene Ferry and Arthur Kierans are all gone from the original top 20. Arthur Kierans is now co-driving for Mark Wedlock. In from the reserves, to run in the top 20, come Willie Mavitty, Seamus Heron and Pat Kirk, all in Mitsubishis. Around 130 cars should start this morning. Further res-seeds include: David Staunton with 154 on his Corolla and Paul Barrett with 151 on his Focus to run in the mid thirties. The special Drive of the Day fHASS Border Championship award will got to the fastest Class 11 crew on stage 3.
More news later: BRIAN & LIZ PATTERSON www.rallynews.net
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