This weeks trip to Carrick on Suir to compete on the Ravens Rock Stages is, for Keith Cronin and Greg Shinnors, purely an exercise to keep them and their Mitsubishi in top shape for the Isle of Man International Rally the following month.

Halfway through their first ever attack on the British Rally Championship they have thus far led the championship, having won the first two gravel rounds and been second on the third round which was run on asphalt. The next BRC round on the Isle of Man is the second asphalt round of the 6 round Championship.

Admiration for the Cork/Limerick pairing has grown significantly in the process across the British Isles. With success, however, also comes significant begrudgery and in Keith’s case this has arrived in the form of hackers on his website which had previously been in trouble-free operation for a number of years.

The Isle of Man is of course also a counting round of the Irish Tarmac Rally championship in which Keith and Greg hold 5th in Gp N(Class 4), although they have competed on only one round so far, that being the Jim Clark International. The Ulster International in August will be the third and final round that encompasses both championships

Back to this weekend, and given the fact that they are seeded 4th overall, they don’t expect to improve on their seeding in the course of the event! They will continue to run on BRC fuel(which is lower specification to that normally used on this side of the Irish Sea) and they also plan to run on previously used tyres in order to curtail expenditure on an event that is of no material significance to the BRC.

If they had decided to re-map the car to Irish fuel specifications and run on new tyres as they did on the West Cork Rally, they could possibly challenge for the lead or at least mix it with the WRC cars on selected stages.

The competition in their Group N class will also be hectic as the top 10 includes some of the fastest Group N exponents in this country, including current Tarmac Group N champion Kevin Kelleher. Anthony O’Halloran, Gary Jennings, James Foley. Current National Championship Group N leader Thomas Fitzmaurice is also on the entry list.

Gary Jennings will certainly be on the pace as he will be match fit having led the class on last weekends Donegal International Rally until mechanical gremlins got the better of him. An unknown quantity will be James Foley, who is always devastatingly quick, but, the unknown factor will be his car, which is the latest (EVO 10) version of the Mitsubishi Lancer. Anthony O’Halloran can always be counted on to be there or thereabouts in the final shakeup although it is uncertain if he will start.

Regular BRC competitor Dave Weston also makes the trip across the Irish Sea, in order to get a taste of Irish asphalt prior to the Ulster International Rally in August.

All in all there is an exciting weekends rallying ahead and as always, members of Keith’s Supporters Club (Cronin Motorsport Supporters Club) will receive text message updates on the teams progress at least every two stages.