MEIRION Evans and co-driver Jonathan Jackson finished second at the Galway International rally, the opening round of the Irish tarmac rally championship.

This was the 51st running of the event, and once again proved very popular with competitors from Ireland and further afield with the entry filling very quickly.

Among the 125 strong entry list were the Lampeter and district members Evans and Jackson, in their R5 specification Volkswagen polo, and Ian Evans, in his historic specification BMW M3.

The rally consisted of 15 stages over the course of the weekend, giving some 190 kilometers of competitive motoring to all.

The opening day saw nine stages totalling over 88 kilometers, with atrocious weather condition, making the stages very slippery and challenging. The day consisted of three stages, Kiltormer, Foolagh, and Linehill, with each stage ran three times.

Merion Evans got off to an excellent start, setting the fastest time over the day’s opening stage by 2.2 seconds, with Ian Evans finishing 89th overall.

On the second stage, Foolagh one, Meirion and Jonathon once again showed excellent pace, setting the second quickest time. Although this dropped them to second overall in the event standings, they were only half a second off the event leader.

Ian and co-driver Mark Chrisp were given a time of 8 minutes 53.5 seconds due to an incident, so they shared that time with many of the other competitors. This lifted them to 84th in the overall standings.

For the third stage of the day and the final of the first loop, which was also the shortest of the three, Meirion and Jonathon once again set the quickest time, which was 2 minutes and 3.3 seconds, by a narrow margin of 0.4 seconds ahead of their rivals. This meant whilst they still remained in second overall the gap was now down to a very slim 0.1 seconds,

Ian and Mark were 107th on this stage which saw them hold 83rd overall.

Onto the second loop of stages, Meirion and Jonathan dropped slightly off the pace, but still set a very respectable 6th quickest time, 6 minutes and 53.5 seconds. This kept them in second place overall but the gap had increased to 3.1 seconds.

Ian and Mark set a time of 8 minutes and 47 seconds, showing just how much harder the conditions were making it for two wheel-driven vehicles. This was still good enough for 88th quickest here and saw them lay in 84th overall.

Foolagh 2 was next, and Meirion and Jonathan were back on podium positions with third overall on the stage with a very impressive 8 minutes and 13.3 seconds. This meant they stayed in second place overall but the gap had increased slightly and they now lay 9 seconds off the rally leader.

Unfortunately Ian and Mark’s rally came to an end of this stage with the BMW being retired.

Back to the short stage of Linehill and Meirion and Jonathon tied with two other competitors for third place; another example of just how tight the competition was and how evenly matched the front of the field were.

The gap between the event leader and Meirion was 10.2 seconds.

For the final loop of the day’s stages, Evans continued to push hard in the difficult conditions. They showed incredible consistency with their times that was always in or near the podium placings and by the end of the day they held an excellent second overall. The gap between them and the event leader was still a very narrow 14.1 seconds so it was all to play for on the second day of competition.

This was made up of two stages repeated three times each, Brady’s yard and Black road.

On the day’s opening stage, the Welshmen were slightly off the pace with the eighth quickest time, just over 20 seconds down on the fastest time of the day. This dropped them down to third overall in the event standings but they were only three seconds behind second place.

On the following stage, Black Road 1, they went all out and had a simply fantastic time, beating everyone by over 14 seconds over the 20 kilometer stage, lifting them back into second overall and saw the leaders’ margin slashed to just over 5 seconds.

Back over to Brady’s yard and the Polo pairing managed a very respectable sixth fastest which was enough for them to hold on to their second place overall.

They were once again quickest on the second passing of Black Road, although this time their time was only 3.2 seconds ahead of the next quickest competitor. After this stage the gap between the event leader and Meirion was 6.8 seconds.

With only one loop left it was still anybody’s for the taking. For the final run over Brady’s Yard this time Meirion and Joanthan were fourth quickest, a good improvement over their previous effort, this time only 10.8 seconds off the fastest time.

The rally was to be decided on the final stage of the day, the third and final pass over Black Road, a stage where Meirion and Jonathon had been dominant over the first two passes.

They once again tired incredibly hard on this stage, and despite coming into contact with a stone wall, they still managed fastest time, although their margin was a slimmer 0.6 seconds this time around.

This meant that after a full 15 stages of battle they finished the rally in an excellent second overall, only 14.1 seconds off the event winners Josh Moffett and Andy Hayes.

This was an excellent start of the year for the Welsh pair, with Meirion commenting that it had been one of the most enjoyable races he had been involved with in a long time.

The next round of the Irish tarmac championship will be the West Cork international rally on 19-20 March.