International

Clare motor club members Tommy Flanagan and his daughter navigator Leanne from Lough Cutra, Gort were the winners in class 10 and they finished 15th overall in the National Section of last weekends “Safety Direct Galway International Rally”. This was Tommy’s tenth Galway International Rally having first competed in 1985 and has won class awards in eight of the ten rallies he has competed in. Driving his Ford Escort 1600cc on last weekends two day rally tommy built up a two minute lead in the class ahead of Declan Forde and James Power also driving Escorts at the end of Saturday’s nine stages.

On the two sunday morning stages “The Black Road” and “Duniry” which were repeated three times tommy added another 23 seconds to his tally but on the last couple of stages he developed gear box problems and had to drive to the finish without fourth gear. He eventually won the class by one minute and twenty four seconds.

Tommy’s son Keith, with navigator Martin Murray finished second in Class 9 driving his Toyota Starlet.

The overall winners of the Rally were Gareth McHale and co-driver Brian Murphy (Ford Focus WRC). They finished 43 seconds ahead of the Ford Fiesta S2000 of Craig Breen/Gareth Roberts. Co-driver Brian Murphy previously won the Galway Rally twice with Gareth’s father, Austin who won the rally six times. Gareth’s brother Aaron with co-driver Eugene O’Donnell secured third place.

Dermot Kelleher, Pro clare motor club