Tralee has been identified as one of three locations to potentially host the Irish round of the FIA World Rally Championship in 2025.
A local bid team, made up of members of Tralee Chamber Alliance, Kerry Motor Club and Killarney and District Motor Club have made it through three different rounds of negotiations with officials from the sport’s governing body Motorsport Ireland and the final site inspection will take place in Tralee this week.
The bid team, made up of former World Rally Championship co-driver, Killarney’s Paul Nagle, outgoing Tralee Chamber Alliance president Nathan McDonnell, and other Kerry-based motorsport professionals who hold extensive FIA World motorsport Championship experience have identified the Munster Technology University North Campus as an ideal location to host the event.
If successful, Tralee will be the base of the proposed Rally Ireland headquarters and Service Park which is set to be included in the WRC for at least three years from 2025.
Hosting the event could be worth more than €100 million to the local economy per year and would also highlight Kerry’s famous scenery and hospitality to an estimated worldwide audience of over 100 million people.
“This is a massive opportunity for Kerry and Irish motorsport,” said Nagle who competed in the FIA World Rally Championship as a professional co-driver between 2004 and 2022.
“This is a great chance to promote Kerry and Ireland to a global audience.”
The staging of a full WRC rally in 2025 is dependent on Government funding, and Motorsport Ireland is seeking in the region of €12m in government funding for a three-year deal to bring the event to Ireland.
One of the criteria to hold the event in Tralee is a 10,000 square metre solid footing site for the WRC service park, along with ancillary modern buildings and infrastructure to accommodate the media centre, administrative functions, and medical centre.
The MTU and the Kerry Sports Academy have been identified as one of three preferred locations in the country to meet such criteria.
The North Campus’s facilities meet all the requirements and have already been used to host major events like the International Rose of Tralee Festival.
The Kerry bid has identified Tralee as the main hub for the event, hosting the international teams, media and officials staying in the county capital for up to ten days.
Killarney is proposed as a prime location to house the rally’s fan base and dedicated Fan Zones given the large amount of hotel accommodation, entertainment venues and hospitality options available there.
Around 150,000 spectators, many of them overseas visitors, would be expected to visit for the rally every year, meaning Kerry Airport’s location and international access would also be seen as a favourable boost to the local bid. This would also make the Kerry World Rally event one of Ireland’s largest-ever regional sports projects.
The venue’s proximity to world-famous rally roads like Moll’s Gap and Slea Head would also be attractive to event promoters, providing unique and breathtaking backdrops of the Skellig Coastline to the global television broadcast.
In August this year, Motorsport Ireland invited all motor clubs in Ireland to submit potential bases for the rally.
The Kerry bid got through three different rounds of presentations, one online in October and two in-person meetings in Portlaoise and Dublin in November and December and is joined by Limerick and Waterford as potential host destinations.
The final WRC selection stage takes place this week when Motorsport Ireland officials and senior World Rally Championship officials will visit Tralee for a comprehensive site inspection.
The visiting delegation will be taken on a walking tour of the MTU’s Dromtacker Complex before meeting with local politicians and business leaders.
The Tralee visit will take place on Thursday morning, before travelling to Limerick later that day and to Waterford on Friday.
A final decision on the preferred location is expected early next week.
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