2009 Fiesta SportTrophy Ireland

Final Championship Points

Posted: April 16, 2009 12:13 PM

Pos Driver Points
1st Craig BREEN 145
2nd Mark DONNELLY 111
3rd Robbie BARRABLE 99
4th Shane BUCKLEY 83
5th Paul QUINN 60
6th Stephen WRIGHT 40
7th Liam REGAN 34

Fiesta Sporting Trophy Ireland

FST is go in Ireland for 2009

Posted: January 13, 2009 3:46 PM

M-Sport, organisers of the Fiesta SportTrophy IE, have announced details for the 2009 Irish championship. The calendar will see six high profile asphalt-based events centred once again based around the prestigious TROA Irish Tarmac Championship.

The series will begin with the Galway Rally in January. Competitors will then travel north of the border for the Circuit of Ireland in April before moving to the opposite end of the country for the Killarney Rally of the Lakes in May. The Donegal International Rally in June will make up round four whilst the Ulster International Rally, will be the penultimate round. The championship will finish with the Cork ‘20’ Rally in early October.

For 2009 the Fiesta SportTrophy will run with an exciting new format. Fiesta crews will now start the event on day one; seeded within the international field. The Fiesta event will run for the first day (or first 120 kilometers approx) of the event, ending at a convenient place at which point the times from all registered Fiesta crews are extrapolated into a set of results and are declared final. The major difference for 2009 is that any crew that has entered the full event under the normal entry procedure, under the International permit, who wishes too, can then carry on and compete in the remainder of the rally. This allows them to not only score points within the Fiesta SportTrophy but also within the ITC. For the Donegal Rally the format will remain as it did in 2008 with registered crews competing on day two of the event only.

Crews will compete for prize-money on each event of the series with the top-eight sharing a total of 2925 EUR per round. The winning driver at the end of the year plus one wildcard will be offered a chance to compete in the ‘FST International Shoot-Out’, which will take place at M-Sport in December 2009. The championship victor will also walk away with a funded drive on the final round of the Belgium Rally Championship, The Condroz Rally in November 2009 in a new Fiesta R2.

M-Sport Business Development Manager, Andrew Wheatley said:
After a second exciting year in the Irish championship we have taken into consideration helpful feedback from teams in an effort to make this year’s series even more successful. We have kept the classic tarmac rallies and tried to allow competitors that want to move forward with the ST the chance - as they can now enter the full international event and still score FST points. It should be a very exciting year.

FST Ireland Co-Ordinator, Richard Millener said:
We hope that our modified format will attract new and old competitors from Ireland and some more of the crews over from the UK to experience the fantastic atmosphere and close competition that the Irish championship has to offer. After some stunning results by competitors in 2008 it will also be very interesting to see how some of our competitors fair within the Irish Tarmac Championship. The year should be incredibly thrilling.

Championship Rounds

Posted: January 13, 2009 3:45 PM

1. 16-18 January   Galway International Rally     
2. 10-12 April     C.O.I International    
3. 1-3 May Killarney Rally of the Lakes   
4. 19-21 June      Donegal International Rally    
5. 21-22 August    Ulster International Rally     
6. 3-4 October     Cork '20' International Rally 

Fiesta Sporting Trophy Ireland