BARBADOS RALLY CARNIVAL TEAM TRAVEL TO IRELAND FOR WEST CORK RALLY

Rally drivers Ryan Wood, Chris Hoad and Greg Cozier Along with co-driver Natasha Farnum travel to the Clonakilty Park Hotel West Cork Rally in Ireland this week to tackle that event in a trio of 1970s Ford Escorts. Wood and Hoad will be partnered with local Irish co-drivers Eoin Collins and Kevin Flannigan respectively, while Natasha Farnum will sit alongside Cozier as usual.
They will be competing against nearly two hundred other amateur teams from Ireland, Northern Ireland, England, Scotland, Wales, USA, Australia, Singapore and South Africa, over three days and 250 Km of tarmac stages, in what is the largest National rally held anywhere in Europe. The Wood and Hoad Escorts are entered in the modified 1600 class and Cozier’s 1972 Escort RS1600 in Historics.
When asked about the trip, Cozier had this to say: “We built Vaucluse Raceway in 2000 and started the Barbados Rally Carnival in 2001. Foreign rally car shipping was subsidized by the Barbados Tourism Authority on two conditions; the event had to take place during a tourism slow period and guests had to stay for a minimum of ten nights. The Vaucluse Rallysprint on the first weekend, a week filled with social activities and then Rally Barbados on the second weekend all came together to meet those conditions and entertain our rally guests completely.
Due to the immediate success of the Carnival we felt we needed to reciprocate to keep it fresh. Amateur rallying is an adventure sport; most people want to enjoy their travel experiences with family and friends while seeing the world through a rally car windshield. In order to keep the Carnival momentum going, we created the Andrew Philips Memorial prize in 2003. If a visitor won the prize (based on points from best result in RallySprint Qualifying, RallySprint finals, each leg of Rally Barbados and Super-special at the end) they won a trip back to Barbados. If a local won it they got a trip to a foreign rally.
It was won by local driver Barry Gale the first year in his Evo 5 and his prize trip was to the Cork 20 rally in Ireland with Neil Barnard co-driving. Other locals who won it were Sean Gill who competed in the Trakrod Rally Yorkshire with Michael Cummings and Adrian Linton who competed in Rally GB with Jonathan Linton. Attending and exchanging prizes with different rallies each year gave Bajan competitors and organisers the widest possible exposure to international rallying in order to improve the organisation and creativity on Bajan events.

Last November, 20 years later, Chris Hoad won the Andrew Philips Memorial prize and his prize trip is back to Cork to help us re-launch the Barbados Rally Carnival taking place this November, where the winner of class 13 for modified two-litre cars will win a trip to the Barbados Rally Carnival. It is easier for foreign rally teams to travel at the end of their seasons when their support groups might appreciate a change of weather and launching the event in March gives competitors long enough to make plans”.
When asked what their realistic chances of a good result were, Ryan Wood responded: ‘Boy, to finish first you must first finish! My only goals are to get to the end without wrecking the Escort and get to the bar before Hoad and Cozier. As much experience as I might have in Bim, Irish roads and conditions are completely foreign to me so I’ll be taking my time and listening very carefully to Eoin!”
Hoad’s outlook was similar except he has the advantage of having Kevin Flannigan guiding him through the Irish lanes. Kevin has rallied in Barbados before and a good friend of many Bajan competitors. Hoad netted his Rally Carnival prize trip by dominating the BimmaCup class at Vaucluse Raceway’s International RallySprint, RallyCross and Motorsport Island Stages, which ran for the first time in December 2023.
“I started rally driving relatively late in life, only five years ago” said Hoad. “I won the BimmaCup rookie prize then a few more events after that but most of my early rally years were spent co-driving. In an unfamiliar car on strange Irish roads the best I could hope for is a finish so I’ll be taking my time like Woody. As Ru used to say, taking your time isn’t laziness!”.
Every West Cork Rally competitor will receive a Barbados Rally Carnival flier in their documents bag when they sign on at scrutiny, so all details on entry fees, shipping arrangements, flights and lodgings will be widely disseminated directly to the people who need it.
The 2024 Barbados Rally Carnival runs from November 22nd to December 2nd and includes International RallySprint and RallyCross the first weekend, a week packed with social events, then the Motorsport Island Stages over two days the next weekend. More details are available on the Facebook page.

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