Next Club Meeting July 6th 2009

The next IMC meeting will take place on Monday July 6th at 9.00pm in The Thatch Bar, Ladysbridge. All club members are asked to attend. New members are always welcome.

Imokilly Motor Club Grass Surface Autocross Review

By: Joe Fitzgibbon, IMC P.R.O.

On Saturday and Sunday last June 13th &14th, all roads led to Ballymacoda for our second event of the year - a grass surface autocross. As round 7 and 8 of the National Autocross Championship, a real quality entry was envisaged across all the classes and so we were not disappointed as a very respectable 23 competitors took to the start line on the Saturday and 26 on Sunday.

Glorious sunshine greeted the crews on their arrival to the field on Saturday After scrutiny had been completed, each competitor got a practice run followed by 3 timed runs.
Fastest out of the blocks on the first timed run was Christopher Culleton who stopped the clocks on a time of 01:27:36 followed closely by Mikey O'Connor on 01:30:55 both in specials.
In the saloon category, Ger Brennan pulled out all the stops in his very nimble Ford Fiesta to claim the fastest saloon award on day one with a time of 01:35:69.
Of the IMC competitors, Wesley Daly set the benchmark for the rest clocking up a very respectable time of 01:43:84 on timed run one followed by Emmet Cronin at 01:49:87, Bobby Benskin at 01:50:83 and Richard O'Brien on 02:00:95 all in MK2 Escorts followed by John Dolphin in his special with a time of 02:20:93.

The second timed run saw Chris Culleton once again having the upper hand as he punched in a time of 01:28:30 and Mikey O'Connor a fraction of a second off on 01:29:60. On the home front, John Dolphin really got in to his stride and crossed the finish line with a great time of 01:37:92. This run saw most of the rest of the field improve their times as the track started to churn up more grip.
After a short break, all the competitors entered the field of battle once again for timed run three. This time however, roles would be reversed as Mikey O'Connor powered his special to the fastest time of the day on 01:27:20 and so took the overall award on day one by a fraction of a second to Chris Culleton.

Class winners on Saturday were:
Class 1A Paul Collins
Class 2A Thomas O'Sullivan
Class 2B Wesley Daly
Class 3B Bobby Benskin
Class 4A Christopher Culleton
Class 4B Jimmy Lucey
Class 5A James Commins.
Best ladies award went to Niamh Driver.
John Dolphin took home best IMC members award.

On Sunday morning after some alterations to the course, the battle resumed once again. First the saloon cars took to the track and Ger Brennan resumed where he left off on Saturday and stopped the clocks on 01:40:28 which was once again enough for him to take home the best saloon award.
Christopher Culleton and Mikey O'Connor matched each other stride for stride both finishing on a identical time of 01:28:24 which would set up a really exciting finish to the event. Over the course of timed run two and three, the spectators were highly entertained from some really good racing right down through the classes but the best was yet to come.
Because of Mikey and Chris having identical times on run one, we had to head for a shoot out to determine the overall winner. Both men and machines headed for the start line and when the lights went green, both gave it their all over the course of the three laps but it was Chris Culleton who came out on top on a time of 01:28:56. Mikey O'Connor posted a very respectable time of 01:32:47.

Class winners on Sunday were:
Class 1A Dessie Brady.
Class 2A Thomas O'Sullivan.
Class 2B Owen Murphy.
Class 3A Ger Brennan.
Class 3B Wesley Daly.
Class 4A Chris Culleton.
Class 4B Jimmy Lucey.
Class 5A David Beamish.
Overall Event Winner: Mikey O'Connor

We at Imokilly Motor Club would like to thank everybody who took part over the weekend and anybody who helped out in any way in making this event such an enjoyable and successful occasion including our COC Jamie McCarthy.

Photos are available to view in our gallery on the main site.
Click on the link below to view them.

http://www.imokillymotorclub.com/gallery/?level=album&id=17

All Pictures by Ger Leahy. Official IMC Photographer.
www.rally.pro.ie

Imc Grass Surface Autocross June 2009 Results

The Results of the June Grass Surface Autocross are available to download from our homepage.
Well done to all who took part and made the event a great success.

IMC Grass Surface Autocross Regulations

The regs for the Grass Surface Autocross on June 13th and 14th are now available. Please click on the link on our homepage to download them. Hope to see you all on the day.