Conor Mohan along with Eamonn Kelly have scored their third overall win in the Junior section of the British Rally Championship. The pair finished the Get Connected Rali Ceredigion, round 5 of the championship with a 49.3 second advantage over fellow Irish men and closest championship rivals Kyle White/Sean Topping.
The rally began on Friday with two passes of the Aberystwyth street stage (SS1, SS2) before heading into the proper closed road stages which were to be contested in the dark. After SS2 Kelly/Mohan lay 1s behind White/Topping, but out on the proper stages, Kelly went 9.2s faster on the 5.31km SS3 Glan yr Afon to take the over night lead due to the final stage being cancelled because of an earlier accident.
Day two consisted of a further eight stages. And immediately Kelly/Mohan ran into trouble. Half way through SS5, the longest of the event, they had an impact with a wall which resulted in a bent rear axle on their Rally4 Ford Fiesta. Luckily the damage wasn’t terminal, and they managed to complete the following three stages and amazingly with three stage winning times to hold a 36s lead at midday service.
On SS9, a repeat run over the stage they had their earlier accident on, Kelly/Mohan scored an astonishing stage win by over 20s to extend their lead to just shy of a minute. On the following stage they would however drop 5.1s to White/Topping after suffering a puncture four corners from the stage end. Having left final service with only one spare tyre they sensibly backed off over the final two stages to reduce the risk of last minute drama and secured the rally win and more importantly the Junior British Rally Championship for Eamonn. Eamonn secured the win thanks to a well selected ‘Joker’ round at the Jim Clark Rally.
A ‘Joker’ round is where a driver can select an event to score a max of 5 bonus points providing, they win the event. On the Jim Clarke, Eamonn and Conor did indeed score the overall win, meaning Eamonn came away with a full 30 points rather than the usual 25. Closest rival Kyle White selected the Grampian Forest Rally as his ‘Joker’ event, but would fail to make the finish and thus sored no event points or bonus points. Eamonn currently has 116 points and even with two more rounds to take place, he cannot be beaten due to the championship having two dropped scores, where the competitor disregards their two lowest points hauls. Strangely, the ‘Joker’ rounds don’t count for navigators meaning that despite Conor navigating for Eamonn for the entire championship, he has not secured the championship win. With two rounds still to take place, Conor needs to finish ahead of Sean Topping on just one of the two remaining rounds to secure the Navigators title.
Arthur Kierans guided Alan Carmichael to their fourth win in the BRC National Rally Championship finishing the event with almost a 3:30s advantage over 2nd place Craig Jones/Ian Taylor.
Lakeland Stages Rally
Derek Mackarel and Emmet Sherry were the highest placed Monaghan crew at the Lakeland Forest Rally just outside Enniskillen last Saturday. They finished 8th OA, and once again Derek was the highest placed non R5/Rally2 competitor. Gary McCrudden navigated Alan Smyth to 10th OA and 1st class 7. Paul Kelly guided David Condell 12th OA and 2nd class 7. Ryan Farrell on the notes for Fergal McGuinness finished 35th OA and 2nd class 6. Declan McKenna navigating for Bryan Jardine retired on SS2.
Show and Shine
Monaghan Motor Club are hosting a Show & Shine event with all proceeds being donated to SOSAD. Date/Time: Sunday 11th September, 12-4pm. Venue: Four Seasons Hotel (Rear Car Park). Admission: €20 per car on show-Students half price (With student card). General admission by donations please. Prize for best presented Car. To register to show your car at the event, please direct message the Monaghan Motor Club Facebook page.
Cavan MVAT
Mickey Conlon, Kieran McCarra and James O’Reilly were the sole Monaghan competitors at the Cavan Multi Venue Autotest on Sunday last. Mickey finished 7th OA and 3rd in class B, Kieran finished 8th OA and 2nd class C and James finished 19th OA.
Motor Club AGM
Our Annual General Meeting will take place on Wednesday evening 28th September at 8pm in the Four Seasons Hotel. Our invitation is open to all those who are interested in motorsport, to come long and discuss topics and events for the upcoming season. We will have a special address from the President of our governing body- Motorsport Ireland. This is our first AGM in person since 2019 so please attend where we can collectively discuss matters concerning our sport.
Navigation Trial Classes
Navigation Trial classes continue this Friday night at 8pm in the Sean Mac Diarmada GAA Club grounds, Three Mile House.
PRO: Oisín Sherlock oisinsherlock97@gmail.com
County Monaghan Motor Club 