rally.ie - Stories - Erne Safari Navigation

Report

Posted: November 7, 2016 10:37 AM

Last Friday Night saw the running of Enniskillen Motor Club?s popular Maxol @McAleer?s Night Navigation Rally. The extensive route organised by Drew Wilson and his team has been hailed a success by competitors and marshals alike. With twenty competitive cars starting the event it has to date topped the entry lists for this seasons Northern Ireland Navigation championship.

The event got under way from McAleers in Irvinestown Just after 9pm on Friday night and some excellent roads where chosen for the crews to plot and navigate round on their maps.

With four main classes on the event Expert, Semi Expert, Novice and Beginners the pre event favourites had to be the reigning Northern Irish Navigation Champions Benny Grainger and David Howard, who would face a strong level of competition from Navigation stalwarts such as Leslie & Gareth Hawe, John & Jonathan Henderson and Ciaran and Rachel Carey and that was solely the Expert class.

The event ran very much on time and at the supper halt just before midnight it was still very hard to predict who would win as any one of the leading crews all seemed to be right on time. When all the times had been collated it emerged the winners Leslie and Gareth Hawe had taken their Renault Clio to a well earned victory as the Peugeot 206 of Benny Grainger & David Howard ran them extremely close to one single penalty, with the Henderson?s in a Nissan Micra taking third and the Vauxhall Nova of Carey?s in fourth.

The semi-experts class saw Brian Hanna/ Paul Forsythe take a convincing win in their Vauxhall Astra over John Henderson & Keith Sommerville?s Toyota Starlet.

The Novice class was won by John Boyle/james Woods brought their Ford Focus to a commanding win over the Proton of Kevin & Kris Farrell.

The beginner section was extremely well supported with twelve entrants. Indeed the class winners were complete beginners on what was their very first Navigation Rally as husband and wife pairing of Aideen & Brian McGirr took the win in their Toyota Avensis taking a four penalty win over Mark McCaffery/Marc McGowan in their Peugeot 405, third in that class went to Neil Harron & Patrick Melanophy in their Toyota Corolla.

Enniskillen Motor Club would like to thank the Sponsors McAleers Irvinestown, the Marshals, all the residents along the route and everyone who helped make the event a success.