“It is like the Circuit of Ireland, Rally Legend style, in road cars,” Kenny O’Neill on his Cannonball debut – full report and photo gallery from Tralee

“It like the Circuit of Ireland, Rally Legend style, in road cars,” Kenny O’Neill on his Cannonball debut

Kerry was car-azy for Cannonball – report on the Kerry drivers who participated and photos of the Tralee halt

Cannonball arrived into Ballygarry House outside Tralee for a quick pitsop and some famous Kerry Hospitality last Sunday to the delight of local car enthusiasts.

Top cars included, not one but two spectacular Ford GTs for the first time in Ireland.- a stunning Ford GT Carbon Series and a magnificent Ford GT Heritage Series with the famous Gulf Livery.

The Ferrari Pista Piloti also took a starring role as well as did theLamborghini Aventador SVJs.  Cannonball

Others included McLaren, Lamborghini, Ferrari, Aston Martin, Porsche, Maserati, Rolls Royce and Bentley.

The event has already raised €1,150,000 for Irish charities and, this year, the official charity of Cannonball will be The HOPE Foundation, an Irish Charity doing incredible work with the street children of Kolkata (formerly Calcutta) in India.

Cannonball took in Kerry, Clare, Galway, Westmeath, Longford, Meath, Cavan, Louth and finished at the Titanic Quarter in Belfast on Sunday.

“What am I going to do next weekend?” joked Colin O’Donoghue as he steered a Porsche Panamera Sport away from the Ballygarry House Hotel on Saturday evening.

Fresh from his previous weekend’s rally success in Belgium, O’Donoghue and his future father-in-law, Killarney garage owner Tadgh O’Sullivan, were taking part in their first Cannonball Run in Tadgh’s Porsche.

“Where else would see such a collection of these cars in the one place?” said Tadgh.

Cannonball, the action-packed supercar spectacle, arrived in Kerry on Saturday morning.

After an overnight halt in Cork, the one hundred or so supercars made their way to a lunch stop at the Tralee hotel before completing leg-two in Galway later that day.

The cars and their drivers, many of them in fancy dress, took in Kenmare, Moll’s Gap and Killarney before the lunch-stop. They departed Tralee and headed for the Shannon Ferry at Tarbert, under a Garda escort, via Listowel.

The O’Sullivan/O’Donoghue Porsche was just one of several local cars entered in the event that raises funds for the HOPE Foundation.

Killarney garage owner Brian Glover of BG Motors on the Tralee Road, and his brother Kieran were another local team in the road-run. They drove a Nissan Skyline R-35 on the three-day event that eventually finished in Belfast on Sunday night.

“It is an unreal buzz, ”said Brian. “Young and old love it and we got an unreal welcome in every town we pass through.”

A similar car was driven by Ken O’Neill of O’Neill’s Power Tools in Milltown and Tralee. The cancellation of the exhibition element of the National Ploughing Championships, due to Coronavirus restrictions, allowed the long-time car enthusiast to participate in the event for the first time.

“The two events always clash and we would be too busy at the ploughing,” he said. ““It like the Circuit of Ireland, Rally Legend style, in road cars,”

Tralee garage man Gio Gaudino drove a Mercedes C-Class V8 Bi-Turbo in the event.

“It is great to do something for charity, the target is €120,000 and they will do it,” he said.

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