RALLY NEWS NO.3   Grandstand - Service - Thursday 21.45

UNOFFICIAL LEADERBOARD AFTER STAGE 6
1st (10) Jonny Milner/Nicky Beech (Corolla WRC) 25.02.9
2nd (15) Jari-Matti Latvala/Miikka Anttila (Ford Focus WRC) 25.21.6
3rd (12) Kenny McKinstry/Noel Orr (Impreza WRC) 25.24.0
4th (17) James Thompson/Plug Pulleyn (Lancer) 25.35.2
5th (14) Tapio Laukkanen/Ilka Riipinen (Imprezaa WRC) 25.39.8
6th (11) Derek McGarrity/Dermot O'Gorman (Impreza WRC) 25.41.3
7th (24) Paul Bird/Larry Carter (Accent WRC) 25.48.5
8th (2) Gwyndaf Evans/Claire Mole (MG) 25.52.3
9th (3) Kris Meeke/Chris Patterson (Corsa) 25.59.2
10th (8) Austin MacHale/Brian Murphy (Impreza WRC) 26.20.0

Overnight leader of this Manx International Rally, Jonny Milner, steered his Corolla WRC into the service area and told us "Happy enough, we wanted to push on tonight and try to get an advantage on Tapio and Latvala and its working for now. I feel there is a slight misfire in the car, more of a pop off really, every time I change gear. Its maybe something to do with the water injection in the electronics, hopefully we will have a bit more power tomorrow. I think we made the right tyre choice for that last loop.  The Marine stage and the first of the Castletown stages were dry and then it got quite wet for the 2nd Castletown. We were on an intermediate tyres".  Milner was fastest through the Marine stage, by just over a second from Laukkanen, with Kenny McKinstry and James Thompson equal 3rd fastest. Tapio commented "Everything feels good, we're running on soft roll bars, the car feels nice".  Jari-Matti Latvala was also running a slightly soft suspension set up, his engineer feeling it is a good set up for most of the rally but that the Marine stage was perhaps too smooth. Austin MacHale has also softened his Subaru suspension and said "The car is near enough now, it made a fair difference". James Thompson rued his tyre choice for the last 3 stages, and said "I was trying to be clever, better keeping it safe".  Eamonn Boland started to speed up a bit, getting more settled in the right hand drive car, and said "Looking forward to tomorrow".

In Group N Seamus Leonard made a good tyre choice for this evening's stages. Dickie Curran took a silly gamble, Leonard got ahead.  That seems to be the story of the changeable weather and the wet and dry stages - a real gamble.

In the Super 1600 category Garry Jennings set a fastest time on stage 6 , the first of the Castletown stages, but we think the Peugeot driver got the best of the dry roads.  Gwyndaf Evans continues to lead the Super 1600, while young Kris Meeke commented "We got caught in real heavy rain through stage 6, but overall I'm surprised to be as high up as we are, I want to just try and keep in touch with Gwyndaf.  If I can keep him within a puncture distance I'll be delighted". 

Other stories include - John Lloyd crashing in stage 2 and holding up the cars behind. Dermot Hanafin in the gpN Subaru was one of them, Dermot also suffering from juddering brakes as the discs warped after the ford earlier. Paul Bird in the Hyundai WRC says the new car is "awesome". He's had a half spin but otherwise getting into the new machine. John  Cope in the Escort Cosworth had a first stage spin, and then in stages 2 and 3 the car had a horrendous misfire, but gone well in stages 4 and 5. Just outside the leaderboard Dougie Hall is in 11th, Eamonn Boland 12th. GpN leader Seamus Leonard 13th. Garry Jennings 14th. Dickie Curran 15th. Ryan Champion in the works Ford Puma 16th. Then it is Michael Curran 17th. Aaron MacHale, (18th) his new Lancer suffering a slight vibration that slowed him a little until he found out it was nothing to worry about. Neil McCance is 19th on his first 4 wheel drive outing in the rain.  Paddy White in the Goldman Securities car is 20th, and looking forward to a night's sleep after flying in from Spain for the rally, and getting virtually no sleep at all. More news in the morning. BRIAN & LIZ PATTERSON          www.rallynews.net