| RALLY
NEWS NO.5 Charterhall Service/Saturday 4pm
UNOFFICIAL LEADERBOARD AFTER STAGE 9 Abbey St Bathans 2
1st (1) Eugene Donnelly/Paul Kiely (Impreza WRC) 55.41.8
2nd (3) Tim McNulty/Diarmuid Falvey (Impreza WRC) 56.21.0
3rd (2) Eamonn Boland/Francis Regan (Focus WRC 57.12.8
4th (5) Guy Wilks/Phil Pugh (Lancer N) 57.56.4
5th (6) Mark Higgins/Rory Kennedy (Impreza N) 58.16.4
6th (7) Gwyndaf Evans/Huw Lewis (Lancer N) 58.22.1
7th (14) Gareth Jones/James O'Brien (Focus WRC) 59.12.7
8th (8) David Higgins/Ieuan Thomas (Corolla S2000R) 59.56.9
9th (18) Colm Murphy/Ger Loughrey (Impreza N) 1.00.05.6
10th (25) PJ McDermott/Sean Harris (Impreza WRC) 1.00.11.0
11th (10) Jon Ingram/Ian Allsop (Impreza WRC) 1.00.13.1
12th (19) Roy White/Stephen McAuley (Lancer N) 1.01.05.5
Tim McNulty in the Pierse backed Subaru was fastest over the Abbey St
Bathans test, one of the bench mark stages of the rally, his Tarmac championship
rival Eugene Donnelly slowed a little because of a rear wheel puncture
on his Reid Motorsport Impreza. Guy Wilks maintained his dominance of
the Tesco 99 British Championship contenders with fastest group N time,
almost 5s up on Mark Higgins and 10s up on Gwyndaf Evans.
Eugene Donnelly’s Subaru had a damaged rear right quarter panel
when it arrived in here to service, black marks even extending up co-driver
Paul Kiely’s door, ample evidence of a frenzied finish to that 9th
stage, with the rear tyre flailing the bodywork to bits. Eugene said.
“I was having a great cut at the stage, no idea why the tyre went
down, we drove 4 miles on the puncture. A bit of a shame, I saved the
car over the Bothwell stage so I could have a real good run at St Bathans.”
Tim McNulty said. “I’m taking it stage by stage, just happy
with the odd fastest time and everything is going well”. Eamonn
Boland said an unrepeatable word when he was asked how it was going, which
we took to mean not well, partly because of a spin on a tight right hander
in Bothwell, the same stage where he lost time this morning with an errant
turbo pipe.
Guy Wilks said. “We’re having a real good run, these cars
can’t go much quicker, I haven’t that much experience of them
anyway, and I’m not here to push the boundaries”. Mark Higgins,
who is supported by MIS-Motorsport Insurance Services said. “The
car feels good, I attacked really hard, had a good run, can’t really
get any closer to Guy”. Gwyndaf Evans shrugged his shoulders and
said. “Chose intermediates, I was told there were dark clouds coming
in, it wasn’t the right choice but it cost me less than I expected”.
Interestingly, drivers outside the leading group did get rain.
One very disappointed driver to make it back into service was Phillip
Morrow. If there is any luck getting handed out he seems to get the bad
bit – his Lancer broke its rear differential 2 miles into stage
8 and Phillip did well to keep his time loss within manageable limits.
David Higgins remarked that the car was the best it has been over the
last couple of stages, they have changed the suspension a little and its
handling better, but David admits that corners where he had moments earlier
he is still being a little cautious. He also said of the Toyota that it
is running out of top speed on the very fast sections.
Gareth Jones said he had a really good run over the last couple of stages,
well pleased. Jon Ingram remarked “Not too bad, but the speeds on
this rally are absolutely mental, I keep remembering I have a wife and
2 kids at home!” Colm Murphy is the best of the Irish group N drivers
and is in a solid 9th place now. Colm was saying earlier that the rear
brakes were locking on, the McKinstry mechanics changed the front pads
and the rears and the car is a lot better now. Nick Kenny has retired
his ex Rautenbach Impreza, reportedly with gearbox/clutch troubles. Roy
White has had his Lancer’s ECU remapped and he is getting back up
to speed. PJ McDermott had a sound enough run over the last couple of
stages, no problems but he has slipped a place on the leaderboard. Shaun
Reid is having a good run, moved on to harder compound tyres and it seems
to have helped his speed.
On the last Rally News we said that Owen Murphy was up to 11th –
there were a couple of cars missing off the results list and we reckon
that should have been 13th. Drivers just outside the top 12 include Wyn
Humphreys, Rob Swann and Kevin O’Donoghue in their respective GpN
machines, all going well with no problems. We are still waiting for times
for Connor McCloskey, we have an unconfirmed report that his Lancer may
be off the road on Abbey St Bathans. Looking back a couple of stages James
Wozencroft in the Suzuki was still leading his class and having a trouble
free run while Darren Gass is going well in his new Citroen C2 and leading
his class. Darren was doing a bit too much of the left foot braking and
running out of brakes but that is OK now, his only problem is lack of
top speed.
More news later. BRIAN & LIZ PATTERSON www.rallynews.net
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