The novice pairing of Martin Tynan and Fintan Clerkin recorded their first navigation win with a clean sheet on last Saturday night’s Eamon Harvey memorial navigation trial based in Glenswilly, Donegal. Indeed this is Fintan’s second win of the year, having taken the overall win with local driver Paul Reid on the November Donegal navigation trial to record two wins from two in the Tir Chonaill county this season.
There were 35 starters departed the Glenswilly GAA club, home of the now famous Donegal All-Ireland winning manager Jimmy McGuinness. Thirty time points and three via’s defined the route which beared West from HQ to the town of Glenties almost 30 miles away. A wet and windy night during the early time points made life all the more difficult as the event took in some typical bumpy and narrow Donegal roads and forest lanes. Most crews were managing to stay on top of their times and by petrol halt in Glenties there were clean sheets aplenty. The second half headed back in the direction of Letterkenny, circling AghlaMountain and on towards the Glendowan Mountain range.
With arrival back at final control it became clear that eight clean sheets were still intact, with the novice pairing of Tynan/Clerkin emerging as winners on the novice beats semi-expert ruling. Local semi experts James Greenan and Darren Harvey were awarded 2nd overall in their nissan almera with a three way tie for 3rd overall as per results below.
Other locals to make the trip North to Donegal included navigator Stephen Thornton who coaxed local Donegal veteran Joe Friel out of retirement and they too recorded a clean sheet to share the spoils of 6th overall and 1st experts. On most night’s a one minute deficit would win many an event but not this time as Michael and Ciaran Tynan dropped a minute on the SRS section, dropping them way back to 9th overall! Mac Kierans teamed up with Paul Reid for this event and dropped 4 minutes on the first SRS section to finish in 10th overall. Arthur Kierans took to the navigators seat for this event, partnering Donegal’s Bobby Sharkey in his all new impreza. Arthur reporting that he enjoyed the event but was glad he took his glasses! There biggest downfall was missing time point 10 although they reckon they passed it but didn’t stop. Damian Connolly partnered Gary McElhinney once again but disaster struck on the speed regularity section as Damian’s stop watch gave up the ghost leaving them with no option but to second guess and dropped a massive 12 minutes. Sean McKenna and Gary Farrelly were also in Donegal but were troubled with mechanical woes. Eoghan Corr and Brendan Treanor picked up valuable novice class points towards their border campaign. Conor Meehan/Brendan Keenan along with Cathal Harry/Peter Deery both made the trip to contest the novice class picking up class points also. Father and son team of Peter and Shane Farrell left their luck at home with a non-finish in Donegal.
So at the half way stage of the 2012/13 Squealing Pig Border navigation championship things are still very much to play for. A lot of the top crews didn’t make it to Donegal for one reason or another thus leaving the championship wide open with Midlands, Cavan and Monaghan to host events over the next five weekends.
DONEGAL MC EAMON HARVEY NAVIGATION TRIAL TOP 10
1 Martin Tynan/Fintan Clerkin (Subaru Impreza) 0 marks
2 James Greenan/Darren Harvey (Nissan Almera) 0m
3 (tie) Ciaran Coyle/Kevin Gallagher (Subaru Impreza), Shane Dalton/Nigel McCloughry (Subaru Impreza), Karl Reid/Ciaran Geaney (Subaru Impreza) 0m
6 (tie) Charlie McMonagle/Aidan Friel (Subaru Impreza), Conor Harvey/Kevin McDaid (Subaru Impreza), Joe Friel/Stephen Thornton (Subaru Impreza) 0m
9 Mickey Tynan/Ciaran Tynan (Subaru Impreza) 1m
10 Paul Reid/Macartan Kierans (Subaru Impreza) 4m
Class winners:
Semi-experts: James Greenan/Darren Harvey
Novices: Paul Reid/Macartan Kierans
Beginners: Noel O’Donnell/Ronan Murrin 38m.
Upcoming Events
Best of luck to all local crews heading to the Galway International Rally this weekend and also the Cork 1000 Isles navigation trial. Full Reports next week.
County Monaghan Motor Club 