On the 3rd visit to the Mullaghanish test it was Craig Breen who was fastest by 4s from Alastair Fisher with Tim McNulty 3rd quickest and Gareth MacHale 4th. Conditions are still difficult for the drivers who never know when they are going to come across standing water. Tim McNulty is trying to find a comfortable pace and is succeeding in staying in front although he is not setting fastest stage times. Denis Cronin in 6th place is still struggling with flu and a misted up windscreen on his Subaru. Robert Barrable lost a few seconds on stage 7 to allow Marty McCormack to edge in front in the race for Citroen C2R2 points. Desi Henry is 3rd Citroen and Adrian McElhinney 4th. Aaron MacHale is now up into 12th o/a and setting times comparable to 5th/6th o/a.
Ed O’Callaghan now has 1m18s lead over Washington James in the National Rally. Geoffrey Dolan (Sunbeam) is 3rd. Mervyn Wedlock is 4th in his Escort, the latter two in a race for Modified Cup Tarmac points.
News on Anthony O’Connaill who was taken to hospital following the accident with Mark Sheahan this morning is that Anthony has been released from hospital and there does not appear to be any broken bones, just bruising. Barry Meade told us that there was no serious damage to his Escort following his accident this morning where he was simply caught out in the wet conditions. Tony & Bridget Murphy in their blue Escort had some power steering problems through the middle loop of stages but think they are still doing well in their class. Dave Randles in the ex works Almera has had a few problems with the brakes on the car going a bit “dodgy”. John Hickey is doing the rally is what is basically a road going Impreza and he commented. “When I saw the stages I had to do the rally, it didn’t matter what in!”
In the Historic Rally after stage 8 Mark Falvey in his Escort was leading from Todd Falvey (Porsche 911). Mark Falvey reported a spin but otherwise OK. Todd Falvey’s Porsche seemed to be down on power particularly out of junctions. Todd reckoned that perhaps the choke was sticking on and did a bit of waggling of wires and the car seemed to come good.
On Rally France at the end of Day 2 Loeb leads Sordo by 42s with Petter Solberg 3rd, Latvala 4th and Hirvonen 5th. Ogier dropped back following a broken damper on his Citroen. Raikkonen stopped. Petter Solberg/Chris Patterson fastest through stages 15 and 16.
More news later: BRIAN & LIZ PATTERSON www.rallynews.net
*For SMS results text RALLY ITC to 53030 (Irl) or RALLY ITC to 60066 (UK). Cost 30c/25p. Text STOP to switch off. Provided by stagetimes.com
