West Cork heartbreak for Armstrong and Byrne as McBride and Mullen top Rally4
- Admin
- Mar 18
- 3 min read
A technical issue encountered at the end of the West Cork Rally snatched a maiden international rally victory from the grasp of Jon Armstrong and Shane Byrne on Sunday afternoon.
The duo produced a brilliant performance on their first event together to finish West Cork’s final stage 34.8 seconds ahead of reigning Irish Tarmac Rally Champion Keith Cronin. However, they were deemed to have received outside assistance on the road section to Parc Ferme and were excluded from the finishers list.
The Motorsport Ireland Rally Academy crew faced early challenges with their intercom, leaving Armstrong without any pacenotes for West Cork’s first two tests. Amazingly, Ireland’s European Rally Championship hopefuls remained within 11 seconds of leader Cronin.
Armstrong climbed into second on Saturday morning as the retirement of Matt Edwards put him in a straight shoot-out with Ireland’s usual pacesetter Cronin. Four fastest times for Armstrong kept the pressure on, cutting Cronin’s lead to 7.5 seconds with six stages to go on Sunday.
A pair of searing stage wins on Sunday morning was enough to usurp Cronin’s lead as Armstrong and Byrne took their pace aboard the M-Sport Ford Fiesta Rally2 to another level.
By the end of the three-day event, the MI Rally Academy duo had found the Fiesta’s sweet spot, scoring stage wins on all of Sunday’s six stages to bring their tally of fastest times to a sensational 12 out of a possible 16.
They will bring the stand-out performance into ERC’s opening round, Rally Sierra Morena.
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The MI Rally Academy momentum filtered through to West Cork’s Rally4 category where Kyle McBride and Darragh Mullen took an inspired two-minute, 28.9-second class victory. McBride led from the start, holding off Aaron Browne to take an early three-second lead after Friday’s night-stages.
A strong showing over Saturday’s eight stages put McBride into a dominant position in Rally4, leading the Stellantis Motorsport Rally Cup by almost two minutes. The current Junior BRC leaders kept their cool on Sunday to make it two wins from two starts in 2025.
“I am delighted to get the win in West Cork,” commented McBride. “It has been a brilliant, problem-free weekend.
“The stages were tricky and it was a long three-day event so it is extra satisfying to come out on top. It was our aim to start the Stellantis Cup well and this is as good as we could have hoped for."
“I have to say a big thanks to Darragh [Mullen] who did a perfect job on the pacenotes and also Dad and the BDM Motorsport team who kept the car running faultlessly. Thanks to everyone who has supported us, we are now going to turn our focus to the next Junior BRC round in Carlisle.”
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Keelan Grogan’s West Cork weekend didn't start as he hoped when a technical issue put him out of the running on Friday. A fix was made overnight to allow Grogan and co-driver Ayrton Sherlock a chance to complete the remaining 12 stages. West Cork was a valuable opportunity for Grogan to trial the Hankook tyres he'll use in Junior ERC this year.
While out of the overall running, Grogan went on to set an incredible 10 fastest times in what turned out to be a positive warm-up for his maiden Junior ERC event at the start of April.
“Our main aim for the weekend was to get some solid mileage on Hankook tyres,” said Grogan. “I am really glad that we were able to get back out on Saturday morning and set some strong times across the two days.
“Massive thanks to the guys in service for the effort they put in to get a new engine fitted to the car that allowed us to continue.”
MI Rally Academy co-driver Killian McArdle was locked in a tight battle for second in West Cork’s Rally4 category. Joseph Kelly and McArdle had a strong run over the first two days before dropping out on Sunday.
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