Motorsport Ireland Rally Academy member Eamonn Kelly will contest this weekend’s San Remo Rally, the penultimate round of the FIA European Historic Rally Championship, in Italy.
Driving the same BMW E30 M3 that he drove to victory on last month’s Eurol Hellendoorn Rally, the Junior World Rally Championship points scorer will have experienced co-driver Gordon Noble on the notes.
Fellow Irish rally driver and well-known circuit racer Michael Cullen owns the car.
The Dubliner fields a Volkswagen Polo R5 in rounds of the Irish Tarmac Rally Championship and Kelly has been helping him with driver tuition and testing.
In return, Cullen offered the iconic BMW to Kelly for the legendary Italian rally which gets underway on Thursday evening.
The Donegal-based driver is part of a two-car family team.
His father Donagh and co-driver Rory Kennedy are also entered in the rally in another BMW M3 marking the first time that both father and son will compete in identical cars on the same rally.
Cullen and his son Victor regularly compete against each other in races at Mondello Park.
“Michael has been very good to me to give me this car,” said Kelly. “I have never raced my dad on the same rally in the same car, but Michael understands what that means as he regularly competes against his son in Mondello and that is one of the reasons he offered me the car.”
Kelly was also competing on his home event, the Donegal Harvest Rally on Saturday, in a historic-spec Ford Escort Mk2.
He retired while leading the historic category after a driveshaft failed in the car but he hopes to compete in the Escort again on the Killarney Historic Rally at the end of November.
Kerry Motorsport News 