Turkey Run 2016

The dead zone between Christmas and New Year is a strange time of year so I was very pleased when my good friend Robert Erwin asked me to navigate for him on the Turkey Run stage rally, up at the old Shacklton army barracks at Ballykelly. I have only navigated on one rally before, and I wasn't very good at it, so I told him as long as he could memorise the stage and didn't actually need to rely on me calling him the correct notes then I was up for helping him out.

I was really looking forward to navigating for Robert as he and his father have recently finished the build of a very exciting wee rally car. They have installed a 2.0 Honda K20 engine and Quaife sequential gearbox into a Toyota MR2 Roadster. It's a great going rally car and when Robert gets more comfortable with the mid engine handling characteristics I have no doubt they will put in some great stage times. The car is right at the start of its development and I look forward to watching it get faster and faster out on the stage.

The Erwins were treating the Turkey Run as a test day so it took a lot of the pressure off me. The first 3 stages went well with use getting quicker on each run, but then we had an engine issue which gave us a couple of bad stage times. The problem was eventually traced to a broken spark plug. The rally was running late so the final stage took place in darkness. We didn't have a lamp pod so were driving almost blind, black round bale chicanes are almost impossible to see at rally speed, but we survived and had a good days rallying.

Video of us on stage 3:

And a crazy quick video of our friends Steve Smith and Ashley Boulton on stage 4:

Results:
http://www.rallyscore.net/408/Turkey-Run-2016

Thanks to Ian Geddes for the action photos:
https://www.facebook.com/IanGeddesPhotography/

Ulster Rally 2012

The Ulster Rally rolled around again and as has become tradition we help Paddy McCollum out by doing a passage control on the Saturday, 18th August. It's always an early start but as the weather was to be good we didn't really mind. Marshaling is a much more pleasant experience in the sunshine and it was nice to spend almost the only good of summer outside. Although Rachel did get badly sunburned even though she has suncream on.



Craig Breen had the new 208 R2 out for it's first rally appearance but it was only as a 00 car. The car looked really well and I noticed that it had a wee wooden insert in the handbrake lever which is a pretty nice touch. All the drivers were suffering in the heat and were just a sweaty mess by the time they got to us, they must have been working hard.

My friend Robert Erwin was out in his 1600 RWD Corolla and set some great times though he had some problems that dropped him down the final standings.

 

Bishopscourt Stages 2011

It has taken me a long time to get these videos sorted out but I finally got them edited and uploaded. This is my good friends Robert Erwin and Neil Ervine at the Bishopscourt Stages Rally in March 2011. Robert's rally car is a 1600cc 20v Toyota Corolla AE86 and it goes very well. He thinks the videos look slow but they look plenty quick to me.

Stage 4:

Stage 5:


Stage 6: