Aoife Raftery and Casey Jay Coleman flying the flag in Italy
Motorsport Ireland competition licence holders Casey Jay Coleman and Adam Coffey narrowly missed out on a class podium on their Italian rally debut. The Peugeot 208 Rally4 crew were one of two Irish teams contesting Rally 2 Laghi - Rally dell'Ossola in Northern Italy on Sunday. It was their first rally outside of Ireland or Britain.
Coleman and Coffey were third in the class heading into the sixth and final stage of the rally which was based in the picturesque town of Baveno on the shore of Lake Maggiore. However, they misjudged a tight hairpin bend on the final test and missed out on a class podium by 1.8 seconds. Nevertheless, they won the Under 25 category and placed 15th overall.
“It was a great rally for us. We came out for the experience on typical Italian roads. There was a strong Raly4 class of 14 crews who all had a lot more experience than me but as the rally went on, we were thereabouts on the pace.” said Coleman. “Heading into the last stage we were in third but a small mistake on a hairpin left us to lose the podium spot by just 1.8 seconds.
“We were still delighted with our first Italian event and to get first in the Under-25 class made our weekend even more special. I am looking forward to building on this result and taking this pace to our next events.”
Motorsport Ireland Rally Academy driver Aoife Raftery and her Northern Ireland co-driver Geraldine McBride were on their second Italian event in as many weeks. They were driving a similar Peugeot to Coleman’s and finished the event in tenth place in the same class. They were the top all-female team in the rally and their first-time sampling Rally4 machinery on tarmac.
Both cars were run by Italy-based G Car Sport Racing.