Magic Bullet Stages review

Derek McGarrity got his 2012 Northern Ireland Rally Championship off to the best possible start with a dominating win on Saturday's Magic Bullet Stages Rally.

The opening round of the Championship, held at the Kirkistown Race Circuit in County Down, saw 78 competitors take to the start of the rally. Only 6 stages lay ahead, but it did manage to claim 12 crews.

10 WRC cars took to the start, including McGarrity's Impreza S14, Derek McGeehan's MINI John Cooper Works WRC, reigning Champion 'King' Kenny McKinstry's Impreza S8 and Alan McGeehan's Toyota Corolla WRC. Ford Escorts were well represented, with many MK2 examples, as well as Roy Haslett's screaming F2 example.

Throughout all 6 stages, McGarrity tore the opposition apart, winning each and every stage, eventually ending up with a 38 sec winning margin over Kevin Barrett's S11 Subaru. Perhaps McGarrity's Subaru is better set up for the racetrack-based stages, with the car still running European-spec suspension.

Derek McGeehan took third in the MINI John Cooper Works WRC, albeit over 1 min off the lead. The same MINI that Eugene Donnelly claimed second place overall in his rallying return in Galway a couple of weeks back.

Ray Brammer netted fourth in his WRC Impreza, a scant 4 secs behind McGeehan. Both scrapped throughout the event over the final spot on the podium, with McGeehan taking the spot.

In fifth was Kenny McKinstry. The reigning Champion spun then stalled his S8 Impreza, losing nearly a minute in the process, losing any possibility of a win. But, even without losing the minute, he still wouldn't have had the pace to keep up with McGarrity's S14, 6 evolutions ahead of McKinstry's example.

James Gillen and John McGaffin finished the rally with only 1.4 secs separating the pair of Impreza WRC drivers, with sixth place going in Gillen's favour. Eighth went to Drew Stewart in his MK2, also going fastest 2WD as well. Ninth went to rally car dealer Kieran Graffin of KG Motorsport, driving his usual Lancer Evo 9. Rounding out the Top 10 was Trevor Ferguson, who also won Group N.

As mentioned above, Ferguson won Group N in his Subaru Impreza N11. Neil McCance took second in his Evo 9, 7.5 secs back. Jason Curran, on only his second event in 4WD Group N machinery, took an impressive third, 26 secs back. Indeed, this was Jason's first 4WD finish, as on his 4WD début his transfer box failed, putting him out of the rally.

The Magic Bullet Stages Rally also marked the start of the Junior 1000 Championship, known as the hugely successful Formula 1000 Championship in Britain. 14 year old Ben Crealey, who had Liam Regan on the notes, dominated the rally, taking fastest times on each of the four stages the Junior's contested. His final winning margin was 33 secs over Kyle White. Rhys Bunting came third, nearly a minute off Crealy's impressive pace. Rhys Bunting had the normally Citroen C2 S1600-driving Andrew Bushe on the notes.