Josh Moffett and Keith Moriarty emerged victorious on last weekends Circuit of Kerry Stages Rally, round 2 of the Motorsport Ireland National Rally Championship. The pair finished the nine stage event with just 6.5 seconds to spare over closest rival Callum Devine/Noel O’Sullivan. Despite a few overshoots/spins Kevin Gallagher/Lorcan Moore steered their class 14 Darrian T90 GTR to 3rd overall.
On the opening stage ‘Mount Eagle 1’ Josh was fastest by 3.4s over Callum through the 12.8km test. While Josh was content with his run, Callum was very unhappy with his performance and mentioned that his VW Polo won’t stop for him quickly enough and struggles to turn in. The next two stages continued the same way, with Josh setting the fastest times, with Callum following closely behind.
In first service Callum’s team got working on the car to try make it more comfortable to drive, but on SS4, it was still Josh in control, as he scored his 4th stage win in a row. On the road section to SS5, Callum carried out a few small changes to the car, which seemed to help as he took his first stage win on SS5, but only by the tiny margin of 0.6s. Josh once again took the stage win on SS6, but this time just by a mere 0.2s, to go into the final service with a lead of 8.8s.
More setup changes were on the cards during the final service for Callum, and he was much happier during the final loop. Despite not being able to take the lead off Josh, he did manage to win the all important power stage and receive a bonus point to go along with his 18 points for finishing 2nd overall. That bonus point means that after the opening two rounds of the championship, Both Josh and Callum share the lead.
In the modified battle Gallagher had a huge battle all day with Mark Alcorn/Domhnall McAlaney. After 6 stages Gallagher held a 7s lead, but Alcorn reduced this to 5.5s after SS7. With just two stages to go, Gallagher had to up his game to keep the hard charging Alcorn behind. Amazingly, on SS8, both crews had two overshoots/offs each and still managed almost identical times. Alcorn scored the stage win, but had only reduced the gap by 0.4s. Alcorn was absolutely furious with himself at the stage end as he threw what may have been the class 14 lead away with just one stage and 6.04 kms to go. Alcorn put all on the line on the last stage, but it wasn’t to be as he had another moment and dropped 14.5s, but luckily for him he held onto his 2nd in the modifieds.
Richard Moffett/Darragh Kelly finished 6th OA and 2nd in class 14. Paul Barrett/Kevin Reilly finished 15th OA and 8th class 5. Michael Carbin/Dean O’Sullivan finished 22nd OA and 1st class 20. David Moffett/Paul Lennon finished 26th OA and 6th class 14. Anthony Hand/David McCrudden finished 32nd OA and 2nd class 11R. Ashling McArdle guided Des Lyons to 46th OA and 3rd class 11F. Brian Comiskey/Declan Campbell 73rd OA and 1st class 15. Jason and Daniel McConnon finished 94th OA and 5th class 2. Jack McKenna/Damien Doherty finished 2nd overall in the junior rally, but more importantly, they were top registered crew in the National Championship, and walk away with full points.
Gary McPhillips/Paul Sheridan were 11th OA and 4th class 14, but retired on SS7 and Raymond Conlon/Gavin Doherty crashed out of the event on SS1, both crew were uninjured.
Elsewhere, Conor Mohan was navigating for Eamonn Kelly out in Croatia. With the next round of the Junior World Rally Championship taking place in Croatia in a couple of weeks time, Eamonn and Conor decided to take part in the Quattro River Rally Karlovac as a test for to get the feel of the Croatian roads and the M-Sport Ford Fiesta Rally3 on tarmac. The rally began on Saturday with one Super Special Stage followed by two normal Special Stages.
With rain forecast, the boys hit the stages with full wet tyres, but unfortunately the rain did not materialise leaving the lads no choice but to complete the three stages on the wrong tyre choice. Nevertheless, the lads finished the day in 11th OA and 3rd in class RC3. On day two, nine stages were on the cards. The day got off to a great start on the opening two stages they climbed up to 10th overall, before having a spin and a stall on SS6, which dropped them to 15th. On the middle loop, they were back up to speed and climbed to 13th overall. On the closing loop of three stages, the sky opened and left the roads treacherous as they had a hard slick tyre compound on the car. A puncture on SS10 cost them considerable time, but luckily didn’t cause any position loss and they eventually finished 13th overall and 4th in class.
Mac Kierans was also in action last weekend in Australia. Navigating for Richie Dalton, they unfortunately clipped a fence post near the end of SS2 which broke a steering arm spelling a rather quick end to their event. No spare steering arm meant they were unable to rejoin the event.
Squealing Pig Monaghan Border Navigation Championship Prizegiving
The Border Navigation Championship awards night took place last Friday in the Squealing Pig in Monaghan town. Michael and Ciaran Tynan scooped the overall award once again after defeating Michael’s son Martin Tynan and David McCrudden via a tiebreaker as both crews finished on 52 points. Michael and Ciaran won the tiebreaker as they had two overall wins. Pakie Duffy/Evin Hughes finished 3rd overall.
In the classes, Shane Dalton and Oisín Sherlock were 1st Expert, with Darragh Kelly and Ryan Treanor finishing 2nd. 3rd in the class went to Michael Carbin and Conor Mohan.
In the Semi-Expert class, Darragh Kelly and Patrick Corcoran were victorious, with Aidan Keenan and Eamonn Doherty finishing 2nd. 3rd in the class went to Matt Hume and Sean Marron.
In the Novice class, Declan Tynan and Molly Maguire finished 1st, 2nd went to Shane Maguire (Ballinode) and Ciaran Maguire. 3rd Novice went to Shane Maguire (Stranooden) and Aaron McElroy. Martin and Gretchen Swinburne finished 4th in class with Ciaran McGorman and Ryan Farrell finishing 5th. 6th in the class went to Damien Hagan and Anthony McDonald.
PRO: Oisín Sherlock oisinsherlock97@gmail.com
County Monaghan Motor Club 