After just over a month’s break, the 2025 Motorsport Ireland Junior Rally Series (MIJRS) roared back into life last weekend as the Waterford based Ravens Rock Rally offered our field of future stars a third opportunity to score strongly on tarmac.
With nine stages and 109km of action in store, the 2025 Ravens Rock Rally was always set to be exciting, and after an interrupted opening stage it would be Jack Byrne that would go fastest on the 6.4km Harristown test, the middle stage of the loop.
Byrne, the Circuit Racing star in a Peugeot 208 Rally4, would go quicker than the Ford Fiesta Rally4 of Tommy Moffett by just 0.5 seconds, but neither would finish the day with Moffett retiring on Stage 3 and Byrne on Stage 5, both denting their title prospects.
Two drivers with real intentions to be amongst the championship title race right from the off were Ben McFall & Oran England, and the pair proved that once more in Waterford.
For McFall, a costly time loss due to a stage interruption really hampered his day and saw him ultimately finish fourth, but dig beneath the surface and three stage wins tells the tale of a young man really impressing after making the move to the Ford Fiesta Rally4 this year.
For a driver who we have seen very little of in the series this year, Jack Brennan returned with a bang on his home event and was really on a fast pace throughout, even leading the class at the final Service halt.
Ultimately the previous MIJRS Class 1 winner would end up being overhauled and losing out by just 6.4 seconds, but its no shame seeing the form that Cian Caldwell has been in this season
Heading into the event as Class 2A leader, it was a frustrating day for Jack Kennedy as he struggled to get on the pace of those around him, and ultimately he would have to settle for third behind the Peugeot 208 R2 of Darragh Kelly who had an exceptional drive to come home second, especially considering the same car wrapped up the NI Junior Rally Championship only the day before at the hands of brother Eoin.
The result sees Kelly now sit third in the standings, six points off Kennedy.
Once more though the story of Class 2A was Ross Ryan, as he absolutely blitzed the field to record a clean sweep of stage wins and return to the Finish Ramp with 39.3 seconds to spare over Kelly.
