Top Six for Barry Greer in Fiesta Trophy on Pirelli

Barry Greer Pirelli Rally 2009 Top Six for Barry Greer in Fiesta Trophy on Pirelli

Photo: Roy Dempster (www.roydempster.com)

Top Six for Barry Greer in Fiesta Trophy

Barry Greer (21) from Carryduff, Northern Ireland netted 6^th place points in the Fiesta SportTrophy UK 3^rd round, the Pirelli International Rally. The event based at Carlise Racecourse and held on Friday & Saturday 18^th/19^th April and is the second event using the two tier system in the VK Energy backed championship. The first six stages count towards the Fiesta Championship with competitors then given the option to continue on and score points for the British Rally Championship which the Pirelli is the second round of.

With usual navigator John Lemon unavailable due to imminent university coursework deadlines, stand-in navigator Susanne Wright started her first International event and first rally outside Ireland. Two evening stages awaited the pair and a rear puncture on stage 2 hampered progress.

“ I was a bit slow by own admission on SS1, just took a few mile to get used to Susanne on the notes and was not 100% committed but I was really finding my pace again on SS2 only for the puncture to strike about half way through the stage”

With a bit of catching up to do on Day 2, Greer set about the task first thing by clawing back 6 seconds on the car in front on SS3. Two top four times on the next three stages saw him leapfrog from 8^th in the morning, to 6^th at the close of the Fiesta section of the event, only an agonising 1 second shy of 5^th placed Ross Forde.

“We had what turned out to be a bent wheel on SS6 which made the car a bit nervous near the end of the stage so without that we may have made fifth but it's hard to know how much it affected our time if any”

With the same stage mileage still to be completed in the International rally there was still British championship points to be earned by the Fiesta crews who chose to continue. With stages 8,9 and 10 cancelled due to a fire further up the field it was now 3 stages to decide the BRC points. A strong run on these stages saw Greer end the longer event 4^th in class R3 and 16^th Overall.

“ I’m really pleased with my result, I have enjoyed the rally and am looking forward to getting out again”

With three rounds completed and four to go Barry is placed 6^th in the Fiesta Championship, though it looks increasingly unlikely that he will be able to enter the next two events in the series. He aims to return on local rally the Ulster International in mid August.

Barry Greer/ Suzanne Wright In-car SS4 Pirelli International Rally 2009