UNOFFICIAL INTERNATIONAL L/BOARD AFTER STAGE 11
1st (3) Juho Hanninen/Mikko Markkula (Fabia S2000) 1.37.20.2
2nd (1) Andreas Mikkelsen/Ola Floene (Fabia S2000) 1.37.22.5
3rd (2) Jan Kopecky/Pavel Dresler (Fabia S2000) 1.38.48.0
4th (9) Mathieu Arzeno/Renoul Jamoul (207 S2000) 1.40.59.3
5th (4) Craig Breen/Gareth Roberts (207 S2000) 1.42.00.2
6th (7) Robert Barrable/Damien Connolly (Fabia S2000) 1.42.04.0
7th Wiegand 1.42.49.2: 8th Jennings 1.44.36.0: 9th S. Moffett 1.45.11.4: 10th D. Kelly 1.45.32.6.
Andreas Mikkelsen upped his pace through stages 10 and 11 to move within 2s of Juho Hanninen for the lead of the International. Neither of the Skoda drivers report any problems with the cars. Jan Kopecky in 3rd seems to be driving his own rally now content to let the other 2 Fabias fight it out. Craig Breen is finding the adjustments to the suspension of his Peugeot paying dividends and he has edged ahead of Robert Barrable for 5th place. Barrable has also been making some tweaks to his Skoda’s suspension and picked a softer compound tyre that he said transformed the car. 22 year old Sepp Wiegand from Germany is here to gain experience and he said. “I like the roads here, to feel the car jumping and sliding but I am finding bumps that I do not have in my notes.”
Garry Jennings was again fastest of the conventional group N cars and reports no problems. Garry even took the time out at service In control to give his beautiful baby daughter Jessica a cuddle! Donagh Kelly had a good run through stages 9, 10 and 11 to cut the gap between himself and Sam Moffett to 21s. Donagh commented. “Those are the first stages I enjoyed. I got the tyre choice just right and my confidence came back"” Sam Moffett is still running on reduced power in his Lancer with the anti lag turned well down. Kevin O'Connor survived an off road excursion at a 2nd gear left hander but still leads the Citroen Racing Trophy contenders. Jonny Greer is getting a bit of confidence in his Citroen DS3R3 and has pulled a couple of seconds back from Marty McCormack. Marty’s engineers just changed the Citroen’s gearbox in 28 minutes and it is normally a 45 minute job. Chris Ingram has had gear linkage and tracking problems with his Twingo but is still trying hard.
UNOFFICIAL NATIONAL L/BOARD AFTER STAGE 11
1st (103) Darren Gass/Enda Sherry (Impreza WRC) 1.40.23.3
2nd (102) Eugene Donnelly/Paddy Toner (Corolla WRC) 1.41.45.7
3rd (101) Derek McGarrity/James McKee (Mini WRC) 1.44.17.6
4th (107) Steve Perez/Paul Spooner (Focus WRC) 1.44.27.5
Darren Gass was fastest through stage 11 by just 1s from Steve Perez with Eugene Donnelly a further second back. Kenny McKinstry was 3rd but his Subaru has stopped on a road section after stage 9 when the temperature gauge went through the roof. We spoke briefly to co driver Noel Orr and he thinks it is no more than an air lock in the system but by the time they got it sorted they were over lateness. Just outside that leading group we have drivers such as Adrian Hetherington, Wesley Patterson in his Historic Escort, Drew Stewart, John Waring and Raymond Conlon in his Corolla. Ray Brammer has had a catalogue of problems with his Subaru the most recent being a puncture and a broken fan belt, but he is creeping into the top 10.
More news later: BRIAN & LIZ PATTERSON & MICHAEL www.rallynews.net Follow Twitter @Pacenotes
