SS2: Greer Extends Narrow Advantage over Henry; Wright Starts Comeback Drive
- Updated: 7 August 2021
SS2: After stage two of the Eakin Bros Brian James Trailers Dogleap Rally, Jonny Greer and Kirsty Riddick continue to lead the event in their Citroen C3 but they only managed to extend their advantage by one-tenth, leaving the gap to second position at 2.3 seconds.
“We were behind another car for a whole lap,” Greer revealed. “We tried to pass him but he didn’t see us so I had to back out of it. He was carrying good speed so it wasn’t too bad.”
Desi and Mark Henry continue to hold second position in their Hyundai i20 R5 and are still very much within striking distance of the leaders.
“We caught another car in there in the dust,” Henry said. “It was the worst place possible to catch anyone. I think we easily lost five or six seconds.”
Josh Moffett and Andy Hayes commented that this stage was “better” and continue to hold third from former event winners, Aaron McLaughlin and Darren Curran.
Reigning champion Stephen Wright has started a fine recovery drive after his stage one mishap. He and navigator Liam Moynihan have climbed three places to hold fifth overall, while Jason Mitchell and Peter Ward complete the top six.
“We caught another car in there so that held us up a bit,” Mitchell said. “It’s going to be close at the top and losing that bit of time is all it takes (to drop you down the order).”
Derek and Mark McGeehan were happier with less dust on the stage this time and they hold seventh in their Mini WRC ahead of Derek McGarrity and Paddy Robinson. Less than one second separates the two crews.
In the two-wheel-drive category, Barry Morris (pictured) is still full of smiles. And rightly so. He and Dylan Doonan are now up to ninth overall in their Darrian and have a substantial lead of almost 40 seconds over their nearest category rivals.
Gareth Irwin and Justin McCauley are second in 2WD – a crew we missed in our SS1 report as they had yet to complete the stage. John Bradley and Crawford Henderson are holding third after moving in front of Andrew Gillespie and Joe McNulty. John Bonner, James Kennedy and Gareth Black are all hot on their heels with six seconds separating the category’s second to sixth positions!
There were a few dramas during the stage for a number of crews. Sean Devine’s stage one problems in his Fiesta were compounded on stage two when his intercom stopped working. Michael McGarrity exited the stage with a shake of the head as he still struggled with braking issues.
Class seven’s Lee McLaughlin is sporting some bodywork damage to his Civic after a stage one puncture. “It’s just a fun run now” he smiled. Damian Toner suffered with a broken driveshaft on stage one and Ian Millar clipped something on stage two, causing some damage to a front wing.
Paul Britton was left rueing a stage two puncture and Chris McGurk reported that he caught two cars. Marty Toner and Kyle Diffin also caught another car, couldn’t see in the dust and ended up going across the grass.
Finally, the Nissan Micra zero car had an engine issue during the stage, forcing the crew to walk back to the service park. It’s a stunning car – hopefully it won’t be long until it’s back in action.
Latest results are available from rallyscore.net.
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