Mick Smith is set to return to Rally Barbados for the second time this summer.

Mick Smith is set to return to Rally Barbados for the second time this summer.

By Robin Bradford

Although Killarney by birth, Smith and his wife Jackie live in southern England,he retains close ties with his home country as one of the founder members of the London Irish Motor Club.

In a rallying career lasting 40 years, in a Sunbeam Ti, Hillman Avengers and the Rover Metro GTi Challenge, he has an impressive list of championship, overall and class wins to his credit in the UK and Belgium.

He was persuaded to enter Rally Barbados last year by Ian Barclay, whose son Cameron was co-driver in the Imp, which attracted a huge fan base – and some local sponsorship from Rentokil Barbados – encouraging him to return this year.

As Cameron is entering his own MINI Cooper One this year, co-driven by his brother Will, Smith will have the experienced driver and co-driver Andy Darlington on the notes in the Imp, which was built as a replica of the last works rally Imp and finished in the distinctive Rootes factory blue.

After meeting Darlington for the first time earlier this month, Smith said: “We had an immediate rapport and realised we have a lot of mutual friends both rally and personal, so it was a really fruitful meet. Andy is an experienced guy both as navigator and driver and I’m really looking forward to this now.”

Smith has been competing since 1984 and he rallies now purely for fun, often co-driven by fellow Kerryman, journalist Sean Moriarty, who himself competed in Barbados in 2014 in Brendan Brosnan’s rear-wheel-drive Peugeot 205.

RB24 is the 34th edition of the Barbados Rally Club’s (BRC) premier event which has its roots in the International All-Stage Rally of 1990; since then, the event has grown in stature to become the Caribbean’s biggest annual motor sport International and a key component in the promotion of ‘Motorsport Island’.

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