Last weekend certainly put a fresh complexion on the World Rally Championship with the news that New Zealander Hayden Paddon took his Hyundai to victory on Rally Argentina. It was a bit of a nail biting finish and 29 year old Paddon admitted that he drove the stage of his life over that daunting and rough El Condor test. Second placed Sebastien Ogier didn’t seem too down hearted at the end. He still has a substantial points lead in defence of his World Champion’s title. He knows as well that these rallies are not really level playing fields – under the current rules the World Champion has to run first on the road for most of the rally, sweeping the loose dust and therefore at a real disadvantage.

Closer to home, Joe McGonigle/Ciaran Geaney in their Skoda S2000 had a start to finish win on the Maiden City’s Lark in the Park Rally, Joe even beating the ‘bogey’ on the closed road special stage in Donegal. Adrian Hetherington/Ronan O’Neill took 2nd place in their Escort and John Bonner/Leon Jordan, also in a Mk2, were 3rd. Young Callum Devine had his little Opel Adam into the top six but retired with brake problems. 21 year old Callum from Claudy, had the consolation of being nominated for the year end Motorsport Ireland Billy Coleman Award.

Meanwhile on Sunday, over 120 cars started the Monaghan Stages Rally. An early retirement, before the rally even started, was Kevin Barrett, his Subaru sidelined when the engine wouldn’t start in parc ferme (nipped camshaft). The 9 stages, through Tydavnet and Scotstown territory, were a challenging mixture of very nice roads. Allied to fine weather, the drivers had a ball. Robert Moffett was to have driven the ‘family’ Fiesta World Rally Car, but instead drove one of their R5s. Sam and Josh tossed a coin to see who would drive the World Rally Fiesta. Josh called the toss correctly and duly won the rally, with Sam coming home 2nd. Niall Maguire set some decent times towards the end to take 3rd in his Subaru making it an all Monaghan driver podium.

Behind the top three there was a huge battle, mostly amongst the Mk2 Escort men. It was Jonathan Pringle in his example who was the pace setter. Jonathan lost a few seconds in stage 2 and briefly dropped to 8th, but quickly battled back to 5th behind Stephen Wright in his R5 by first service after stage 3. Pringle was back to 4th by stage 4.

For his part Stephen Wright had a smooth rally in his Fiesta R5 and finished 5th. Gary McPhillips was slightly cautious at the start, but set some quick times as the day progressed to finish 6th. McPhillips’ task was made a bit easier by the retirement of Dessie Keenan (off road) and Chris Armstrong (bent axle). Ryan Loughran, who had a great run on the recent Circuit of Kerry to take ‘Top Escort’ accolade was in the running for 6th, but was just pipped by McPhillips. Ryan, who is from Cookstown and reckoned to be a man to watch in the future, finished 7th, just 1s back.
Vivian Hamill was back in 15th after the first couple of stages and did well to battle up to 8th pipping Adrian Hetherington by just 0.3s and Damian Tourish was just 8s back in 10th. It was all hot and heavy competition throughout the day.

All the top Escorts were big engined class 14 cars, and Damian Tourish was the first of the 2 litre cars, finishing a very creditable 11th. Conor Harvey, driving the Brendan Kelly Toyota GT86 was knocking on the top ten door, but a bit of a spin on a 3R/C a couple of stages before the end caused a damaged radiator and retirement. Shane Maguire/Mac Kierans had a clean run in their Lancer to take the GpN honours.


Top Ten:-
1st Josh Moffett/Jason McKenna (Ford Fiesta WRC) 56m06.0s
2nd Sam Moffett/James Fulton (Ford Fiesta R5) +40.0s
3rd Niall Maguire/Enda Sherry (Subaru Impreza WRC S12b) + 1m14.2s
4th Jonathan Pringle/Alan Keena (Ford Escort) +2m12.4s
5th Stephen Wright/Fintan Sherry (Ford Fiesta R5) +2m24.2s
6th Gary McPhillips/Paul Sheridan (Ford Escort Mk2) + 2m44.1s
7th Ryan Loughran/Leon Jordan (Ford Escort) + 2m45.1s
8th Vivian Hamill/Andrew Grennan (Ford Escort Mk2) + 3m20.0s
9th Adrian Hetherington/Ronan O’Neill (Ford Escort Mk2) + 3m20.3s
10th Damian Toner/Denver Rafferty (Ford Escort Mk2) + 3m28.3s

Class Winners:-
CL1 Ruari McCaffrey/Seamus McTigue (Honda Civic)
CL2 Shane Forde/Darragh Mullen (Citroen C2R2)
CL3 Roger Kennedy/Wendy Blackledge (Peugeot 306)
CL4 Shane Maguire/Mac Kierans (Mitsubishi Evo9)
CL5 Sam Moffett/James Fulton (Ford Fiesta R5)
CL7 Josh Moffett/Jason McKenna (Ford Fiesta WRC)
CL9 Gene McDonald/Kevin Reilly (Ford Escort Mk2)
CL10 John Kelly/Niall Kelly (Toyota Corolla)
CL11F Adrian Sweeney/Shane Buckley (Peugeot 207)
CL11R Seamus Connolly/Gary McCrudden (Toyota Corolla)
CL12 Alan Atcheson/Thomas Wedlock (Ford Escort)
CL13 Damian Tourish/Domhnall McAlaney (Ford Escort)
CL14 Jonathan Pringle/Alan Keena (Ford Escort)
CL15 Martin Tynan/Declan Tynan (Mitsubishi Evo)
CL20 Michael Carbin/Darragh Kelly (Mitsubishi Evo 4)
CL18 Malcolm Pedlow/Ivor Ferguson (BMW 2002tii)
CL16 Darren O’Brien/Damien Fleming (Honda Civic)

Looking forward to this weekend, we have the Cartel.ie backed Killarney Rally of the Lakes, as well as the Pirelli Rally on the cards. In Killarney there should be many points of interest – principally the race for the overall win between the WRC crews and also the anticipated battle between the ‘R5’ drivers for Clonakilty Blackpudding Tarmac Championship points. On top of that, there will be many drivers striving for class wins, and of course the Historics and Juniors as well.

Out at the front of the rally the big race should be between Donagh Kelly and Garry Jennings. Both are previous winners. Donagh will drive his all conquering Focus WRC, with Conor Foley co-driving. Rory Kennedy will co-drive for Garry as usual in their Subaru. A while ago Garry wasn’t at all sure if he could contest the Lakes, but he has been able to get some work done to the car and has a Prodrive engineer on hand over the weekend to fine tune the on-board computers, so it is all stations go for the Fermanagh man. He commented earlier this week from his Kesh oil business “It’s a rally I always enjoy, it’s Bank Holiday weekend, the Randles in Killarney are helping us with accommodation, and I’m now really looking forward to it!”.

Amongst the R5 contenders, there are at least half a dozen drivers who could feature. Keith Cronin for example has scored top points on two rounds of the Tarmac this year and is close to home territory, Josh Moffett is right on top of his game and leads the Tarmac points, Sam Moffett will also be right up there, Alastair Fisher is 3rd in the points and hungry for more in Killarney, Stephen Wright, Joe McGonigle, Owen Murphy and Aaron MacHale will all be in the hunt. Local driver Alan Ring is a real Lakes expert and he could spring a surprise. David Guest is the top GpN seed in his Lancer at No.15 and Brian O’Keefe (Impreza) is No.16. Gus and Pat Kearney in their ‘SEPAM’ GpN Lancers are in a strong position in the Tarmac and they are seeded at 56 and 58 respectively.

The top Modified/National runners are Fergus O’Meara (Escort), Eugene Meegan (BMW 1M) and Jack Newman (Escort). The stages this year (16 of them) are all handily placed and commence on Saturday morning with Gortnagane, Molls Gap not featuring until the Sunday morning. The rally finishes at the Gleneagle Hotel on Sunday at 17.30.

The British Rally Championship Pirelli Rally, based in Carlisle but with all the action in Kielder, is round 3 of the BRC. Elfyn Evans has flown back from Rally Argentina to take his place at the head of the entry in his Fiesta R5. Further leading drivers include Fredrik Ahlin, David Bogie, Matthew Wilson and Tom Cave. Top entries from here include Desi Henry (Skoda R5), Marty McCormack (Skoda S2000), Jonny Greer (Citroen DS3R5), Niall Henry (Lancer), Adam Bustard (Fiesta R2) and Junior points leader Rob Duggan (Vauxhall Adam R2).

There is a historic part of the rally on the Saturday and Stanley Orr is contesting that in his Escort Mk1. Stanley and his co-driver Guy Weaver plan then to change the differential and roll bars on the Escort in a Carlisle garage on Saturday night and then flash down the M6 to a historic tarmac event on Epynt on the Sunday. Phew, that is enthusiasm!

Early news on the Sperrins forest rally on the 7th May and Carlow (8th May) is that both rallies have received bumper entries. The Maghera based McGeehan Motorsport backed Sperrins is a round of the Valvoline National Forestry and McGrady Insurance NI Championships. Rally sponsor Derek McGeehan has entered in one of his Mini WRCs, Kenny McKinstry is in the list with his Impreza WRC, Martin Cairns has got a new Fiesta R5 and he will almost certainly debut that, Mark Donnelly is making the trip from Omagh with his Impreza WRC, Pat O’Connell is heading up from Cashel to compete, Desi Henry, winner of the last round in Ballyvourney, has an entry in, and that is just the tip of the iceberg so far. Carlow has a similar star studded list, and could rightly be termed the battle of the Mk2s. However there is a massive turnout of World Rally machinery as well, with the likes of Roy White, Peadar Hurson, Kevin Barrett, Niall Maguire, Declan Boyle, Manus Kelly (in an Impreza WRC, not an Escort!) and Niall Maguire all entered. The list of Mk2 pilots is equally impressive!

Looking further forward, it was announced this week that the Ulster Rally, a round of the FIA European Rally Trophy, the Clonakilty Blackpudding Tarmac Championship, the British Rally Championship and the McGrady Insurance NI Rally Championship, is to be sponsored for the next three years by John Mulholland Motors of Randalstown and Campsie. The experienced Gary Milligan remains CoC of the 19th/20th August event, which this year will be based in Derry/Londonderry. 52 year old John Mulholland is an active rally competitor with a range of rally cars including his current ex Sebastien Ogier ‘works’ Skoda R5. John is one of the most energetic and successful car dealers in the country, has three franchises, Skoda, Hyundai and Ford – names not unknown in rallying, and promises to bring a lot of impetus to the Ulster Rally.