Irish Notes 9^th Oct ’06.

 

Tarmac Champion Eugene Donnelly is driving the Pirelli test Subaru WRC S11 on this weekend’s Donegal Harvest Rally. This is the same car that Guy Wilks drove in Cork ‘20’, and  Eugene is sampling the Subaru as he plans to move from his current Corolla for the 2007 Pirelli Tarmac Championship. Eugene will have a guest co-driver for Donegal, James Sharkey, who won the seat in a competition.

 

Donegal Harvest top names besides Donnelly include Peadar Hurson, Paul Harris in a Corolla, Patrick Elliott in his Impreza WRC S10, Garry Jennings in an Impreza WRC and Dom Buckley in a GpA Subaru. Local man Hugh Martin Doherty is at 10 in a Focus WRC, while top GpN seeds are James Cullen and young Michael Curran in their respective Lancers. The rally is based at the Downings Hotel, employs some classic stages and is a round of the Border Championship.

 

Austin MacHale’s co driver Brian Murphy is sitting in with young Toni Kelly in her Honda Civic Type R on the Harvest Rally. 

 

Stephen Moore, winner of the Tipperay Forestry event earlier this year in his GpN Subaru,  has upgraded his Focus WRC to an’05 example. He intends to contest both the Irish Forestry and the NI Championships in 2007, and has no further plans for this season.

 

The attraction of fabulous gravel stages such as Dyfi, Gartheniog, Pantperthog and Dyfnant has attracted former top driver Stevie Whitford to enter the 21^st October Bulldog Rally in a re-vamped David Greer Motorsport Lancer Evo 9. Phillip Morrow’s brother Simon will co-drive.

 

Also making the Bulldog trip is former Scottish Championship GpN Champion Raymond Mason from Moneyreagh in his Lancer.   David Crossen in an ex Elsmore Evo 6, Emma McKinstry in her Lancer and John McGaffin (Impreza) are amongst several more who have entered  the Oswestry based rally. The event is the final round of the Fiesta series and young Owen Murphy as well as Jonathan Greer will be competing. 

 

This weekend’s GSMC multi stage event based at Germaines of Baltinglass has attracted a 151 strong entry plus reserves, and James Foley, Tom Holton, Kevin Kelleher and James Stafford are amongst the top entries.

 

 

National Forestry Champion John McCarthy is making gradual improvement after his Wexford accident and has been moved from Dublin to the Cork Hospital High Dependancy Ward.  Following his accident on the Clare Rally Thomas White unfortunately remains very ill in Limerick hospital. While Andrew Nesbitt was discharged from Cork hospital on the Monday immediately after his accident, Andrew’s injuries consisting of 1 crushed and 1 cracked vertabrae. 

 

Derek McGarrity was forced to miss the Cork 20 Rally because his Manx injuries haven’t healed and in fact he had to go back into hospital last week for a further operation.

 

The emphasis in recent years on Irish Rallying has been directed very much at spectator safety and Frank O’Mahony, Chairman of the Rallies Committee, is in the process of setting up a new Safety Action Group to focus on driver safety, particularly bearing in mind the recent spate of sideways impact accidents.

 

Brian Patterson.