Lights out and away we go as the 2024 Sligo Pallets Forest Rally Championship travels to the ‘Northern Gravel Grand Prix’, as the fifth round brings the series to Omagh and to the hugely anticipated Bushwhacker Rally this Saturday.
With a high speed 66km route in store for the crews, the day is bound to be absolutely brim full of drama.
Leading the Championship registered crews away from the Omagh Showgrounds on Saturday morning will be current leaders Derek Mackarel & Eamonn Creedon, they’ll head to the opening 14km Kileter stage knowing that their sizeable advantage.
Boosted by maximum scores in Carrick-on-Suir and last time out on the Lakeland Stages, will leave them with a sizeable target and a possibility for Derek at least to potentially claim the Drivers title.
For David Condell & Mick Coady, they will be making sure to keep pressure on the leading duo though, the pair finished second to Mackarel in Enniskillen on Round 4 and will till rue a costly pair of spins.
Heading to Omagh, the Fiesta Rally 2 of Condell only has a single point advantage over Championship third placed Shane McGirr & Denver Rafferty, the ever-quick Lada VFTS claiming the Top 2WD honour on three of the four events so far this season.
The head of the 2WD field is brimming with Championship stalwarts, especially the Ford Escort MK2 trio of Mickey Conlon & James McEneaney, Hugh McQuaid & Declan Casey and Sam Stewart & Alan Johnson, the latter making sure to make amends for a disappointing retirement last time out when a heavy landing forced the pair to retire.
The race to claim the title in Class 2 of the 2024 Sligo Pallets Forest Rally Championship has been red hot all year, and its set to continue once more as all the big hitters will be battling over the likes of Kileter, Lough Braden & Carrickaholten. Craig Rahill & Killian McCardle, Ryan McHugh & Declan Boyle, Tommy Moffett & Domhnall Lennon and Cian Caldwell & Shane Byrne will be pushing their Ford Fiesta Rally4’s to the limit over the high-speed Bushwhacker route.
James Dunphy & Alan McCormack will wrap up the Class 4 title but will still be looking forward to a good race with Lukasz Czapnik & Piotr Szadkowski, while similarly John Ward & Brian Martyn can become the very first Class 2A champions.
Class 11F is set to be the real ‘one to watch’ as all the main series rivals meet once more. Leaders Eugene Ward & Patrick Heaney lead the runners away, but they will have to battle with the likes of Ian McCarthy & Patrick O’Sullivan, Damien O’Donovan & Vince Goggin, Ciaran McCullagh & Cormac Noonan and Christy Butler & Ann Hutchinson.
