By John Kenny
Ireland’s Kris Meeke and co-driver Paul Nagle were delighted with their fine fifth place in the Rally de Espana yesterday, the penultimate round of the 2011 competition.
Meeke, the 2009 Intercontental Rally Challenge (IRC) champion, finished 5:15 minutes behind overall winner Sebastian Loeb in his Citroen and almost two minutes behind his Mini team-mate, the Spaniard Dani Sordo.
Meeke has struggled somewhat this season as Mini made a return to the WRC, failing to finish in his four previous events, but will take heart from his top five place in Spain ahead of the final round of the season, Rally GB Wales next month.
"That was the perfect end to this rally for me" said Meeke.
"To be quicker than Dani on the same tyres on his home patch is something pretty special. Over the whole rally I don’t have the experience to compete with the other guys yet, but this shows that when I know where we are going we can be with them."
Waterford’s Craig Breen finished 15th overall and a stunning fourth in the Super 2000 category in his privately entered Ford Fiesta,
Breen hit problems on the opening stage yesterday when he sustained a broken rear drive shaft on the morning opener, stage seven.
The 21-year-old had to complete stages eight and nine before he could get the problem resolved in service and as a result he dropped to fourth in the Super 2000 category and 17th overall on the leaderboard.
However Breen managed to get the car to the finish and by the end of the 18-stage event, he was placed 15th overall and in a superb fourth place in the S2000 class, won by another Ford Fiesta driven by Finland’s Juho Hanninen, the current IRC championship leader.
