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| Monaghan Stages Rally |
| RALLY NEWS No.5 - After SS7 - Sunday @ 16:52:51 |
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RALLY NEWS NO.5 End of Stage 7/Sunday
UNOFFICIAL LEADERBOARD AFTER STAGE 7 Smithborough
1st (1) Niall Maguire/Enda Sherry (Impreza WRC) 1.02.19
2nd (4) Adrian McElvaney/Paul Kelly (Impreza WRC) 1.02.49
3rd (2) Kevin Barrett/Sean Mullally (Impreza WRC) 1.03.27
4th (5) Sean Gallagher/Marie-Claire Gallagher (Impreza WRC) 1.04.26
5th (6) Gary McPhillips/Mark Tierney (Escort) 1.05.37
6th (31) John & James Cairns (Impreza A) 1.06.04
7th (10) Des Moore/Arthur Kierans (Escort) 1.06.29
8th (12) Danny & Rory McBride (Lancer N) 1.06.34
9th (7) Maurice Moffett/Jason McKenna (Starlet) 1.06.49
10th (21) Anthony Hand/Emmet Sherry (Escort) 1.07.02
The rain sweeping across the Monaghan countryside towards Newbliss got really heavy just as the leading drivers were about to start stage 7 and as the roads soaked so the difficulty factor soared. Niall Maguire was first through the stage and his time was quite a bit slower than his first two visits to that Smithborough test and Niall said at stage finish. “Very slippy and very wet. We were on intermediate tyres but it was still difficult”. Kevin Barrett was next up and he said. “We picked too hard a compound tyre”. Kevin dropped 16s to Maguire and more importantly perhaps 13s to McElvaney. As for Adrian, he said. “That’s brutal. So wet but at least its not just as important what gear I’m in. The box still has a mind of its own”. Sean Gallagher in 4th seemed to ease right back, Sean in a time buffer zone of his own now, he can’t really catch the cars in front and Gary McPhillips is over a minute behind. As for Gary, he was in a bit of a lather at stage finish having spun his Escort and scuffed the front of the car.
Des Moore had the best two wheel drive time of the top drivers and seemed almost surprised at stage finish. While Maurice Moffett’s co driver Jason McKenna leapt out of the Starlet, grabbed a wheel brace and started to check the nuts on the wheels as Maurice said. “Wild vibration out of the back of the car”. John Cairns managed to hold on to his 6th place despite having totally the wrong tyres fitted to his GpA Impreza. Danny McBride in 8th had no real problems apart from the wet roads. Jack Maguire forfeited his 10th o/a when he pulled his Escort Cosworth in to the side of the road near the start of the test. This opened the door for Anthony Hand to move into 10th on his home stage, Smithborough, not bad going for a 1.6 Escort.
Just outside the top 10 with 2 stages to go – Gerry Cassidy is 11th in his Escort G3 on a total of 1.07.08. Mac McKenna continues to improve, getting into his stride from 21st at first service and is now 12th o/a on a total of 1.07.24.
In the Citroen Racing Trophy Adrian McElhinney has improved from a conservative start to move into the lead of the Citroen C2R2s. He is just 1s up on Sam Moffett with Martin Tynan another second back and Mark Kane plus 24s. A young driver from Tempo in Co. Fermanagh, Stephen Baxter, was really impressive through the early stages and looked like he was going to challenge for the C2R2 lead but unfortunately has crashed out in stage 5. David Smith and his co driver John McKenna had a short rally when their Peugeot lost its oil pressure on the first stage and they were forced to retire. David and John saved our bacon yesterday along with Cian Curley and his co driver Gary McKenna when they managed to open the locks on our Subaru Outback after BP locked the keys inside!! Thank you again lads!
More news later: BRIAN & LIZ PATTERSON www.rallynews.net
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