Raymond beats Marc in Johnston family duel

Editorial Department • Published 6 May 2010 14:11 0 Comments

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Raymond Johnston on his way to victory at the McAleer's Spar Stages Rally.<<

The 2010 McAleer's Spar Stages Rally turned into a family duel between Raymond Johnston and son Marc, with the more experienced of the pair emerging victorious on his home event.

Raymond is having a successful season in 2010 leading the Group N standings in the Northern Ireland Rally Championship, and he transferred that good form to St Angelo on Monday, leading from start to finish to emerge ahead of the Impreza WRC of George Robinson and the similar Mitsubishi of son Marc.

The airfield based rally is always a firm favourite among competitors and spectators alike, and once again a large crowd, encouraged by the spring sunshine, turned out to witness the newly extended stage layout.

The event opened with the Johnston pair posting the two fastest times over the opening stage, and they maintained their family stranglehold on the top of the leaderboard until the half way point of the six stage rally. After a slow start however George Robinson was starting to reel in Marc, and he finally split up the family dominance on stage four, eventually finishing four seconds behind Raymond and six ahead of Marc.

Further down the field the class battles were raging, with several local crews vying for honours.

In class three Trillick's Nigel Mills was locked in a day long fight with Raymond Dennison, and he eventually had to give second best, falling just over a second short of the class win.

There were no such concerns for Gary Sheridan, who opened up a five second lead in class three after the first stage and maintained his lead thoughout the day, finishing clear of Andrew Bustard and Enniskillen's Mervyn Wilson.

Shane McGirr is a multiple class winner on the St Angelo event, and he was involved in a titanic struggle with Damian McGrath at the head of class five. Shane held a narrow advantage after three stages, but his Starlet fell back to second place over the closing stages.

Niall McShea was the expected early leader in class six driving an Escort in spectacular fashion, but when mechanical problems brought his rally to a premature end on stage five Trevor Elliott was let to uphold Fermanagh honours, eventually sealing third in the class.

Class seven was dominated by local Escort drivers. Ronan Campbell emerged victorious in his BDA version, ahead of Andrew Trotter and Brendan Campbell.

This article appeared in Impartial Reporter 06 May 10

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