Last Saturday’s Donegal Harvest saw 127 cars start the main rally. Fermanagh’s Garry Jennings in a McKinstry Impreza WRC S10 came out on top with an impressive win. Co-driven by Neil Doherty, as he was when winning this year’s Donegal International, Jennings remarked at the Abbey Hotel finish that Donegal is certainly being kind to him, as this made it his Harvest hat-trick as well as winning in June. Declan Boyle, co-driven by his cousin Brian Boyle, upheld local honours by taking a fighting 2nd place. Brian O’Mahony/John Higgins made the trip from Cork more than worthwhile by not only making it a Subaru top three, they also clinched the Dunlop Championship crown. 28 year old O’Mahony, an environmental engineer, was British Junior Rally Champion at 21 and Super 1600 champ at 25, so he is no stranger to rally success. O’Mahony won 3 of the 8 Dunlop rounds during the season. He described this final counter as. “Difficult, even with the points buffer. I eased off a bit, tried not to make any stupid mistakes."

The rally sported one of the best entries of the year, and Donegal Town shook off the hangover of winning the “All-Ireland” a few weeks ago to welcome the rally with open arms. There was a palpable carnival buzz around the town as the rally circus gathered. Eamonn McCafferty headed the Donegal Motor Club team who made the rally such a success while it was a very proud Chief Marshal and current COC of the Donegal International, Eamonn McGee, who uniquely had three sons in the All-Ireland Final a couple of weeks ago,

Matters were a bit tense however when the drivers faced the first of the stages, the 15.4 km Ballintra test. It was cold and damp, and at the stage finish almost all the drivers reported more than a few lurid moments. Thankfully there were no major incidents, and Declan Boyle was fastest, by 3s from Jennings. Brian O’Mahony did remark that he had hurt his wrist badly when the front wheels of his Subaru locked up.

Through stages 2 & 3, which included the famous Lough Eske stage, Garry Jennings really speeded up to open up a 9s gap over Boyle, with Donagh Kelly just 1s in arrears. Jennings did have a major moment when his Subaru ploughed into a hedge in a tight section at the end of Lough Eske. These were two fairly jumpy stages, and 2nd placed Boyle described his Impreza’s handling as a “disaster” over the bumps.

Boyle was able to get his Subaru’s handling more to his liking as the day progressed and he posted a couple of fastest times, but Jennings was able to protect his lead. One of his three fastest times was over the final run on Lough Eske (the name means “Lake of the Fishes”). It is an iconic test. On one Circuit of Ireland many years ago, the unshakeable Terry Harryman could only talk about the showers of sparks in the darkness as his driver Paddy Hopkirk’s works Mini careered down the Lough Eske road on its roof! Donagh Kelly’s brave drive came to naught in stage 7 when his Subaru developed a severe front wheel vibration.

Behind the leaders, the battle for Dunlop Championship supremacy gradually swung O’Mahony’s way during the day. Both Thomas Fitzmaurice and former National Champion Niall Maguire could also have taken the title. However Tralee man Fitzmaurice admitted that he never really “got into the zone” during the day. Also, as the roads dried over the final loop he was much too conservative in his tyre choice. For Maguire it was an outside chance that he could take another title. However he gave it a good go, but some brake problems with his Subaru really put paid to that.

Maguire still finished 4th o/a, Fitzmaurice 5th. Kevin Kelleher had a fraught day on his way to 6th, and kept saying that he just couldn’t get the grip in his Subaru, and indeed had quite a few overshoots and various moments. Declan Gallagher had a brilliant and copybook drive to take 7th o/a and best 2-wheel drive in his Starlet. Martin Doherty kept everything smooth and controlled to take an impressive 8th o/a and win GpN in his Lancer. Camillus Bradley and Dessie Keenan were 9th and 10th in their Escorts. Keenan hasn’t rallied for 2 years, and showed he hasn’t lost the magic touch, overcoming some electrical problems with his class 11 Escort to record some startling times.

Normal front runner in the Escorts, Frank Kelly, had a fraught day that included putting his Escort in a garden, and finished 12th behind Columba Heena who overcame brake problems on his Corolla to take 11th. Arthur Kierans, co-driven by his son Mac, was 16th following some delays when his Escort clipped a bale on a bridge, but his class 12 win should be enough for him and his co-driving son to retain their Border Championship title. Retirements included Kevin Barrett, whose Subaru suffered sheared wheel studs. Shane Maguire went out with gearbox trouble on his GpN Impreza and James Stafford’s Darrian had gearbox woes.

What a difference a day makes, Following the Harvest, Frank Kelly, this time with Martin Brady co-driving in his Escort, took victory by quite a margin on the GSMC Baltinglass Stages from Eugene Meegan with previous winner Danny Barry, also in an Evo 10, 3rd. Kelly’s Escort was back to its pristine self after an overnight visit to the body shop and, free of Dunlop Championship restraints, Frank was back to his old self.

He commented at the Germaines of Baltinglass finish, "We had a great day, good stages and drove the door handles of the car, the way it should be driven, and the wet conditions were no problem. I’ll never drive the way we did on the Harvest again, trying to stay in the middle of the road. It’s not often I feel pressure in a rally car, but on the Harvest nothing worked. Liam is always immaculate on the notes, and even his timing wasn’t right because I wasn’t attacking. But the Harvest was the accumulation of two years work really, trying for the rally.ie award. We did get it, but it would have been easier to forget about it and just attack!" For the record, behind Kelly, Meegan was 2nd and Barry 3rd, a puncture slowed Alan Ring was 4th, Stephen McCann 5th and Lloyd Hutchinson 6th from the 75 starters.

On last weekend’s IRC San Remo Rally Craig Breen/Paul Nagle sustained a puncture on their Peugeot and this dropped them to 6th at the finish. The rally was won by Giandomenico Basso in his Fiesta S2000 with Jan Kopecky 2nd in the Skoda. Juha Hanninen’s Skoda went off the road spectacularly and ended up parked on the roof of a small house.

The IRC in its present format is being amalgamated into the European Championship next season. Although the Circuit of Ireland has a slot, the same basic financial IRC criteria as before will almost certainly apply, and it is not yet clear if Circuit supremo Bobby Willis will be in a position to go ahead with that sort of a commitment. Bobby commented earlier this week, "It’s an honour to be included on the calendar. We still need more sponsorship to make it work, and I am working like hell on it!"

This weekend rallying action is centred on the Gullion Rally in Co. Down, the Cambrian Rally in Wales, and the WRC in Sardinia. Derek McGeehan plans to compete in Wales with his Mini WRC. The car has just had some upgrades fitted by Prodrive, and is still in forest trim. Martin Cairns also plans to make the trip with his Subaru. In Sardinia the 43 strong entry list is headed by 9 times World Rally Champion Sebastien Loeb in his Citroen, followed by Hirvonen, also in a DS3 WRC, then the two works Fords of Latvala and Solberg, followed by a bunch of other Fiesta WRC’s, two works Minis, two S2000 works Skodas and then a plethora of Lancers and Imprezas, mostly driven by Italians. With the race for this season’s WRC titles settled, and just one more round to go after this one, it will be interesting to see if the status quo alters in any way as the drivers will have a slightly freer hand. It is of course musical chairs time in terms of contracts for next year, and the announcement by Ford Motor Company that they are stepping down as title sponsor adds even more spice to the mix. Hopefully the Ford decision will not have too much of an impact and they will still have a significant input.

The Formula Karting Gullion Rally is definitely running this weekend despite having a low number of entries. The event has 2 stages with a total of 40 stage miles and scrutiny etc., is all taking place on Saturday morning, including one “recce” run. Some of the entries already received include Camillus Bradley, David Armstrong, Norman Armstrong, Fintan McGrady Damien Toner, Mervyn Wedlock (all in Escorts) and Brendan Cumiskey (Lancer). The Newry & District MC will still take entries for the event and the man to contact is Paul Mulholland on 0044 7715 368008 or for more information visit the club website at www.nadmc.co.uk