This weekend’s Skibbereen Mini Stages event has attracted over 170 entries for the 151 available spaces, which is pretty remarkable considering that the eligible cars are restricted to two wheel drive.This normally means of course that ‘Mk2 Escorts rule, OK!’ However, behind No.1 seed Paul Purtill’s Escort is James M Stafford in his Darrian and at 3 is Brian O’Mahony in his Renault Clio. Stafford is normally very quick in his Darrian, while Cork man O’Mahoney has turned in stunning performances on the first two rounds of this year’s Tarmac Championship, and both could shake the Ford stalwarts. The rally is based in the Celtic Ross and there are two stages repeated over demanding West Cork terrain.

Charlie Donnelly, the current Dunlop National Champion, has been giving his friend Glenn Allen a helping hand on this year’s National Championship, although Charlie had to miss yesterday’s Monaghan Rally as he had agreed to assist the Police Service NI with a road safety ‘Motor Madness’ day at Magherafelt. Charlie’s brother,Tarmac Champion Eugene Donnelly, along with rallying DJ girl Sonya Mac, also helped with the day. Charlie, who has just passed his Institute of Advanced Motoring test, is still planning one rally outing this year on his home 19^th May Sperrins Stages event.

The Sperrins has traditionally been a forest stage event, but has switched to the asphalt for the past couple of years and now has a hugely oversubscribed entry, which must tell some sort of story. Charlie was originally planning to do the Sperrins in Eugene’s Tarmac Championship Impreza WRC S12, but what with insurance costs and one thing and another, he’s settled instead for the trusty family Corolla WRC.

Allen did lead Monaghan initially, but then fell into the clutches of firstly Dessie Keenan and then Michale Barrable. Allen’s third place was still good enough to take the lead in the Dunlop series. Keenan’s victory in Kenny mcKinstry’s Impreza WRC, his first run ever in a WRC machine, was another clear demonstation of the Monaghan man’s talent, and a reminder as to why he won the Billy Coleman Award a few years ago. 27 year old Michael Curran again drove a brilliant event to finish 8th o/a and take a clear GpN victory. This makes it a clean sweep of GpN wins on this year’s series. His Lancer was totally stripped at the finish, right down to measuring the stroke of the engine. The Currans have maintained that the engine is completely standard, not even tuned, and so it turned out.

Peter Wilson (Civic) won the Junior section of the Monaghan Stages  Rally, with John McQuaid (Escort) 2nd and Gerard Boyle 3rd.

Triple NI Champion Kevin Lynch has entered this weekend’s Abbey Hotel Roscommon based Midland Moto Stages. Kevin is anxious to clock up as many stage miles in his Focus WRC as possible before the next Tarmac Championship round, the Killarney Rally of the Lakes. Kevin also plans a trip to the Manx National. Top drivers on the Roscommon event include Jack Sleator, Noel McCarrick and Sean Gallagher in their Impreza WRC’s, also Gareth Jones/Greg Shinnors in their Focus WRC. The rally is also a round of Rory Galligan’s Irish 205 Challenge, with 12 contenders currently led by Tullamore’s Kenneth Keyes.

Donegal property developer P.J McDermott switched from a BMW M3 to an Impreza WRC S9 from Derek McGarrity a while ago, and has now moved up again and has taken delivery of Martin Doherty’s Impreza WRC S11. PJ is getting married this weekend to Natasha, a former Miss Ireland, with the reception at PJ’s new hotel in Burt.

Danny Gormley has been confirmed as Clerk of the Course again for the Shell Donegal Interational  and has promised a tougher and longer event. The rally will take place over the weekend of June 15th – 17th, and Gormley has promised some new stages as well as some not used for a while.

This Sunday sees another major marshals training day opportunity, with the Motorsport Marshalling Partnership putting on an event at Loughrey College, Cookstown. Many aspects of motorsport training will be covered, and the main contact is Barry O’Neill on 07740 510551.