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RALLY NEWS NO.6
Parc Ferme Galway/Saturday 4.30
UNOFFICIAL LEADERBOARD AFTER STAGE 7 Flowerhill
1st (5) Eugene Donnelly/Paul Kiely (Impreza WRC) 1.00.24.0
2nd (1) Marcus Gronholm/Timo Rautiainen (Focus WRC) 1.00.36.1
3rd (2) Gareth MacHale/Paul Nagle (Focus WRC) 1.02.00.2
4th (4) Eamonn Boland/Francis Regan (Focus WRC) 1.02.05.8
5th (3) Mark Higgins/Rory Kennedy (Impreza WRC) 1.02.18.7
6th (8) Kevin Lynch/Gordon Noble (Focus WRC) 1.02.19.5
7th (14) Stephen Murphy/MJ Morrissey (Impreza WRC) 1.02.30.9
8th (12) Ray Breen/Damien Morrissey (Focus WRC) 1.02.44.3
9th (16) Michael Barrable/Dermot O'Gorman (Focus WRC) 1.03.14.7
10th (11) Patrick Elliott/Paul Goodman (Impreza WRC) 1.03.35.6
11th (9) Gareth Jones/David Moynihan (Focus WRC) 1.03.42.3
12th (6) Austin MacHale/Brian Murphy (Focus WRC) 1.04.06.3
Early news from stage 8 – Gronholm 7s faster than Donnelly.
Donnelly leads after stage 8 by 5 seconds.
A stage 7 puncture on his Ford Focus WRC has meant former World
Champion Marcus Gronholm slipping back to 2nd place behind Tarmac
Champion Eugene Donnelly. These two have been having a great
race all day and Gronholm had a 7s lead going into stage 7 but then
that puncture turned everything on its head. Marcus finished
the stage with the front left tyre deflated and said again about
how slippy he was finding the roads. Donnelly’s Subaru
had had its gearbox changed in service as a routine precaution and
he was also asking for some fine suspension tuning to be carried
out. Eugene also said at the end of the stage that he was
finding the conditions lethal, so slippy, and it was giving him
concern that there might be a big accident and at the same time
he was trying to push his Subaru to new limits and brake deeper
into the corners. This is the first time of course that Eugene
has driven this actual car on a rally so he doesn’t know just
how hard he can push it. Gareth MacHale was fastest on that stage
7 and his comment was. “We’re flying now!”
Eamonn Boland made his usual comment. “Not a bother”.
While Mark Higgins said. “I’m in despair, I just can’t
drive this car, I don’t know whether it is the slippy roads
or what”. Kevin Lynch in 6th place was shaking his head
at stage finish and remarking about just how slippy the roads were.
Stephen Murphy lost a few places going back to 7th following a spin
then he stalled his Impreza. Ray Breen is having a smooth run to
hold a very solid 8th.
In Group N Roy White was leading but by less than a second from
James Foley. Roy survived a broken drive shaft in stage 5 and as
well as that said he is really struggling for grip. We said
earlier about Seamus Leonard crashing his Lancer into a wall.
Eventually Seamus drove the car back to service and there was remarkably
little damage, but we think he may have been over maximum lateness.
Garry Jennings is 3rd GpN. Kevin Kelleher 4th. Kevin O’Donoghue
5th. Damien Tourish 6th. Some Class leaders after stage 6 included:
Enda Hallanan in his Civic and Mike Carty in his Civic Type R. News
of a further retirement is that Dave Randles has put his Nissan
Almera off the road and into a ditch on a slippy square right on
stage 4 and ran out of time. More news after last Saturday stage.
BRIAN & LIZ PATTERSON (with thanks to Michael Patterson &
Zoe Todd) www.rallynews.net
*For SMS results and news to your mobile text RALLY ITC to 53030
in Ireland and 60066 in UK. Cost 25p/30c. Text RALLY STOP to stop
at any time. Provided by stagetimes.com
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