-
Castle Automobile Club - Castle Mini Stages Rally 2008

The heavy rain seen at the Ulster International Rally and scrutiny for this event on the Saturday had thankfully disappeared on the Sunday morning of the rally to give the 150 crews the best chance at a good days competition. Seeded at number one was Pat Donegan & Sean Hayde in their George Crozier Motorsport prepared Mk2 Escort. They set the only time over stage one to take the early lead but it was car no 2 who would make the first headline. Tom Holton & Francis Kenny in their Toyota Celica ST205 were 2nd on the road behind Donegan but an accident involving a concrete post, leaving the car on it's roof meant that the stage would be stopped to send in the assigned ambulance. Thankfully both men were ok but were checked out by the ambulance as a precaution. This meant that all cars received the time of Pat Donegan and the rally restarted on Stage 2.

On that 2nd stage it was Rodney Wilton & Conor McMahon that set the pace in their Mk2 Escort which is also prepared by George Crozier Motorsport. Taking 3 seconds from Pat Donegan on that stage meant they were now in the lead with Gary McPhilips & Mark Tierney (Mk2 Escort) another 4 seconds behind Donegan in third. Trevor Mulligan & Lisa Roe (Mk2 Escort) were 4th fastest and top SVS In-Car Camera crew, Alan Sheridan & Alan Tuite (Mk2 Escort) completed the top 5 overall. Many commented on how the Mk2 Escorts were dominating the event so convincingly on these fast stages and why the 4 wheel drive cars weren't even in the top ten so far. This may be in part due to the bad luck suffered by early non-finishers Dominic Loughran & Mark Kane in their SP Motorsport Mitsubishi Lancer Evo 9 and Darren Caldwell & Martin Costello, also in an Evo 9. Darren & Martin retired in service with a blown turbo and damaged differential. They could have continued but with no power and putting the diff to further damage meant there would be little point in going back out again. Both Evos had their cameras taken back out again at service and we hope to see them back out again soon.

Stage 3 saw that famous blue Mk2 Escort of Rodney Wiltons set fastest time again with Trevor Mulligan only 1 second slower to move into 2nd place overall. This would drop Pat Donegan to 3rd overall but only by 1 second and now 10 seconds off the lead. Gary McPhilips is now 4th overall and Alan Sheridan still holding on to 5th.

The fourth and final stage would see big changes in the top 4. Alan Sheridan & Alan Tuite held 5th overall in their red Mk2 Escort. A consistent drive all day brought them back to the Oldcastle House Hotel as top SVS In-Car Camera crew. Russell Woods & Martin Byrne set the 3rd fastest time in their blue Mk2 Escort to jump right up from 6th overall to 4th at the finish. The men who had occupied 4th overall - Gary McPhilips & Mark Tierney lost almost 3 mins on that last stage dropping them out of the top 40.

Rodney Wilton & Conor McMahon went into that last stage trying to hold on to their rally lead. They set a time of 7 mins 44 seconds which was 5 seconds slower than Russell Woods but enough to stay in front of his fellow Cavan rival. Next after Rodney was Trevor Mulligan & Lisa Roe. Trevor has been on a serious pace this year winning lots of top 2 wheel drive awards and he showed his potential by beating Wiltons time by a full 9 seconds to move ahead of Wilton and potentially take the rally lead. But as fast as that run was - it wasn't enough to take the win as Pat Donegan & Sean Hayde flung their Mk2 through the 4th stage a whopping 11 seconds faster than Rodney Wilton and 2 seconds faster than Trevor Mulligan to steal the overall rally win on the very last stage by only 1 second!

Many Thanks must go to Joe Curran & his team. The Castle Automobile Club and the Oldcastle House Hotel.

We hope to have a video report available within the next couple of weeks so stay tuned to this website....

Results:

1 Pat Donegan/Sean Hayde (Ford Escort Mk2) 29m 13s,
2 Trevor Mulligan/Lisa Roe (Ford Escort Mk2) 29m 14s,
3 Rodney Wilton/Conor McMahon (Ford Escort Mk2) 29m 14s,
4 Russell Woods/Martin Byrne (Ford Escort Mk2) 29m 31s,
5 Alan Sheridan/Alan Tuite (Ford Escort Mk2) 29m 31s,
6 Michael Curran/Mark McNally (Ford Escort Mk2) 29m 36s.

Full Results and Times:

rally.connect.ie (Angus Sealy)
Castle Automobile Club Website