Donnelly and Kiely seize control in the Isle of Man

Reigning Irish Tarmac champions, Eugene Donnelly and Paul Kiely are in total control of the Rally Isle of Man.

Fri, 20 Jul, 2007 - 21:47

Reigning Irish Tarmac champions, Eugene Donnelly and Paul Kiely are in total control of the Rally Isle of Man.

At the conclusion of the second leg this evening, they are three minutes and 16.2 seconds in front of Eamonn Boland/Francis Regan (Ford Focus WRC). British crew, Guy Wilks/Phil Pugh (Mitsubishi) are third, they head the British Rally Championship contenders.

Donnelly’s position as rally leader was under threat over this morning’s stages. His overnight lead of 8.8 seconds was slashed to just 0.3 of a second as Andreas

Mikkelsen posted a string of fastest times.

Donnelly gained a slight reprieve – just over two seconds on the fourth stage of the day.

Mikkelsen’s challenge for the lead nose-dived on S.S. 9 when he slid off in the wet conditions. The

Norwegian lost over seven minutes and dropped to 14th.

Suddenly, the pressure was off as Donnelly led new second placed incumbent Eamonn Boland by almost two minutes.

Donnelly got a further boost a few stages later when Mark Higgins, his rival in the Irish Tarmac series, slid out of the rally.

Mikkelsen was the star performer for the remainder of the day as he fought his way up to seventh.

Aside from Donnelly and Boland, Irish driver, James Cullen (Mitsubishi) is eighth overnight while PJ

McDermott (Subaru WRC) and Darren Gass (Citroen C2) are just outside the top ten.

1. E. Donnelly/P. Kiely (Subaru WRC) 1h. 23m. 56.8s.

2. E. Boland/F. Regan (Ford Focus WRC) 1h. 27m. 13.0s.

3. G. Wilks/P. Pugh (Mitsubishi) 1h. 27m. 27.9s.