Out at the front of rally it was Eugene Donnelly who set the pace through the massive Fanad Head stage, 7 secs up on Gareth MacHale, almost 10 quicker than Eamonn Boland. Donnelly was at a loss to explain his dominance on that one, said he was doing anything differently. Gareth MacHale reported the stage mostly dry, and he had been running a hard dry weather tyre at the front, but really that tyre choice was very much a matter ‘six of one and half a dozen of the other’. Tim McNulty said he went ‘not too bad, but still some intermittent troubles with the engine, it might be down 10%’.
PJ McDermott reported his Subaru tyres ‘going off’ towards stage finish. Sean Devine reckons he has the clutch problems fixed on his Subaru, but lost a little time on a long righthander where he clipped a rock, despite co-driver Robert McDaid calling DON’T CUT from the notes. Michael Doherty had his first clean run of the day through Fanad, and joked that his rally re-starts from here, following a troubled morning.
In the battle for GpN Seamus Leonard has woken up again and set the fastest GpN time, from Sean Gallagher. Damien Tourish still holds 3rd in the category despite his Lancer engine not being on full song.
In the Modifieds Wesley Patterson has moved to the front, even though he lost a few seconds when his Escort’s tyres went off. Wilton reckons he picked too soft a compound tyre and that’s one of the factors in him losing his lead. Gary McPhillips is still 3rd, Maurice Moffett in his Starlet 4th Martin Magee unfortunately crashed his Escort out on Fanad, and quite a few drivers stopped to check if they were ok. Perhaps Maurice Moffett lost the most time. Brian Brogan’s Escort stopped, a broken steering arm the cause.
In the Fiestas, Craig Breen still leads, with Mark Donnelly into 2nd. On the Ypres Rally, after stage 9, Freddy Loix just led from his Peugeot teammate Kris Meeke, just 0.2 secs between them. Kopecky in the Skoda was 3rd, a handful of secs back. More news later, Brian Patterson.
