How some of the local crews fared on the Cork ’20’

Keith Cronin and Mikie Galvin secured the 2024 Irish Tarmac Rally Championship in a dramatic finish at the Cork ‘20’ Rally, the final round of the series, on Sunday.
The Killarney and District Motor Club duo edged out defending champions Callum Devine and Noel O’Sullivan.
The championship was decided on a tiebreaker after defending champions Callum Devine and Noel O’Sullivan had amassed an identical record of three wins and two second-place finishes.
Cronin and Galvin’s fourth-place finish on the Rally of the Lakes proved to be the decisive result, giving them the edge over Devine and O’Sullivan.
The victory ensures that the co-driver’s title remains in Killarney, with Galvin and O’Sullivan members of the Killarney and District Motor Club.
The Cork ‘20’ Rally was a challenging affair, with heavy rain making the stages treacherous.
Devine, driving a Skoda Fabia Rally2, opened the road and struggled for grip on the wet surfaces.
Organisers elected to cancel the final loop of stages due to the worsening weather conditions. Cronin’s second-place finish was enough for him and Galvin to secure the title for the second time.
“We knew what we had to do, and we did it,” Cronin said after the rally. “It was a tough decision to not go for the win, but we knew that second place was enough to secure the championship. The conditions were incredibly challenging, and it was easy to make mistakes.”
Cronin, also a KDMC member, was full of praise for his Aghadoe co-driver,
“I want to thank Mikie for his work on the notes all year, we won our first Tarmac Championship together in 2016, we won a British title the year after, and we’re here again with another Tarmac Championship in 2024, there are few enough partnerships in rallying that last that long,” said Cronin.
“I also want to acknowledge the support of our various sponsors, it’s not an easy task to put on a full-season challenge for any championship, without them we wouldn’t be here to achieve this success. [Rally engineer] Tom Gahan and his crew have done a top job on the car all year as well, it hasn’t missed a beat all year.”
Co-driver Ger Conway was also amongst the fancied frontrunners but he and his driver Meirion Evans retired from the rally at the first service halt due to the conditions.
They hinted that they were trying to save their Toyota Yaris Rally2 for an undisclosed event later in the year.
“We decided to retire from the rally after stage three. We lost two minutes with a misted windscreen on stage two and every corner was a lottery in this weather which isn’t improving,” said Evans,

“If we had a championship to fight for it’s a different story but we have a nice opportunity ahead of us in a couple of weeks and there was no point throwing it all away by damaging the car on a day like today.”
CLASS ROUND-UP
Conor Murphy and Sean Collins were the top all-Kerry crew in their Ford Escort. They finished 12th overall and third in the Modified category.
Class nine was an all-Kerry affair with Timmy Foley and Ronald Riordan (Ford Escort) taking the win from debutant Eugene Buckley and his experienced co-driver Maurice McElligott (Toyota Starlet).
Kenneth Quirke made the trip home from New York worthwhile as he and co-driver Brid Murphy won Class 12 in their Talbot Sunbeam.
Kerry Motor Club’s Mark Doody guided Michael Britton to second in the class while Sean Hickey and Noel Fleming were third.
Class 12 was also an all-Kerry affair after Tommy Mason and Paul McGlinchey took the win from Sean Enright and Kevin Doherty. Meabh Griffin guided Walter Dick to a class win in the historic section.

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