Tyrone drivers aiming to build on bright starts in North Wales

TWO Tyrone drivers are hoping to build on solid starts to the Fuchs Lubricants British Historic Rally Championship when the action moves to Rally North Wales this coming weekend.

At the opening round of the series, the Riponian Stages Rally, Donaghmore’s Adrian Hetherington finished third overall and Dromore’s Owen McMackin was seventh, leaving both of them well placed ahead of the remaining 10 rounds of what promises to be a keenly contested series.

While Hetherington was pleased with his first round efforts which resulted in a podium finish, he’s also wary that he started the 2023 campaign in a similar fashion only for the wheels to come off his title bid from that point on.

“It was a good result, but it was the same result as last year and we never scored a point after that!,” the Ford Escort driver said with a wry chuckle. “It doesn’t really guarantee anything and just because you scored in the last one it doesn’t mean anything!”

Looking ahead to this weekend in North Wales, Hetherington feels that with the likes of Gwyndaf Evans, Joe Price, David Crossen and Seb Perez being in the entry list the competition will again be fierce, which is why he would be more than happy with a top five finish.

“North Wales is different territory and it’s a different way of driving. Each of the rounds is different so you have to take a different approach each time but you still have to go flat out!,” he added.

“I’d imagine the competition will be even stiffer in North Wales – it was stiff last time too – but with the likes of Joe Price and locals like Oisin Pryce possibly being there it will be even tougher.

“So if we could score decent points, if we could finish in the top five cars in North Wales it would be a good result.”

And McMackin is also hoping to make hay on the North Wales gravel, having played the percentages on the sludgy sand-based surfaces at the Riponian where he was satisfied with a top 10 result, having learned from past experience.

“It was a very slippy event,” the Dromore man explained. “We slid off on the first stage and lost quite a bit of time and then we spun on stage four. I decided after that I was going to bring the car back in one piece.

“It was my first time out since the Bushwhacker last year and I put the car off at the Bushwhacker the year before and it took me 12 months getting the car fixed. I wasn’t going to go through that again so we decided to get some points on the board.

“But this time it’s more traditional gravel which hopefully will help. We’ll try our best because we’d like to be closer to the front so we’ll be trying harder.”