Kelly and Flanagan emerge tops in challenging Galway International Rally

By Sean Hassett

THE 2015 Colm Quinn BMW Galway International Rally will go down in the history books as one of the best ever. Unusually dry weather greeted the drivers over the weekend, but with early morning ice and fog added, the route was extremely challenging for the drivers.

Donegal man Donagh Kelly and navigator Kevin Flanagan in a Ford Focus WRC took their first ever international rally win after driving a faultless event. Kelly commented at the Sunday finish ramp, outside Colm Quinn BMW, that he was “delighted to take the victory” after a very challenging event.

“The rally win to me is even more poignant as I have won the Galway International Rally in a car that was once owned by the late JJ Fleming of Galway,” added the Donegal driver.

Eugene Donnelly put in a late charge to finish second in his Colm Quinn backed MINI WRC. He beat Monaghan man Sam Moffett by a mere .7 of a second after 175 competitive kilometers.

The rally got underway on Saturday morning with the 12.8km Skehanagh stage. Fastest out of the blocks was last year’s event winner, Declan Boyle, in his Subaru WRC, setting a stunning time to pull out a six second advantage over Donagh Kelly.

He extended this lead over stages two and three but it all went wrong on stage four for the Donegal man. The Subaru’s engine refused to start before the stage and thus he incurred a three minute time penalty. This dropped Boyle from 1st overall to 10th just behind Dean Raftery from Craughwell. Raftery was beginning his comeback drive after issues in the morning caused him to hemorrhage time to the leaders.

Donagh Kelly inherited a slender lead over Gary Jennings but on the very next stage Jennings’ challenge ended when his Subaru had an altercation with a Galway dry stone wall. This promoted the Colm Quinn MINI of Eugene Donnelly into 2nd place, fiveseconds ahead of Sam Moffett. The order didn’t change during the final stage of the day with Kelly holding a 38 second lead over Eugene Donnelly overnight. Donnelly, in turn, was six seconds ahead of Sam Moffett.

Sunday morning and Kelly really stamped his authority on the event when he took the fastest time over the infamous Black Road stage. As the crews made their way from the end of the stage to the start of the next, it became apparent that the mornings fog was not clearing and stage 8 had to be cancelled on safety grounds.

By the midday service, Kelly had extended his lead to 47 seconds but the main interest was now between Donnelly and Moffett. They were having a really close battle with seconds being traded on each stage. Donnelly led going into the final loop of stages by a mere one second.

Mofett took the quickest time on the penultimate stage to go ahead by over three seconds. It looked like too big of a margin for Donnellyto make up but he drove the door handles off his Colm Quinn MINI WRC on the final stage to claim second in the rally, only .7 of a second ahead of Moffett.

Donagh Kelly cruised through the final stages, with a comfortable lead over the chasing pack, it was a case of damage limitation. When he came to the finish line of the final stage he was clearly emotional as tears ran down the Donegal man’s face. “I can’t believe it! We have been trying to win an International rally for a long time. We have come close on a number of occasions but to win and in Galway is just amazing.”

For more, read this week’s Galway City Tribune.