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O’Regan and Butler win the 1000 Shakes
Round five of the Motorsport Ireland
National Navigation Championship took
place on Saturday night last. Greg Shinnors
along with his driver, Andrew Mackarel
were the organisers of this latest
championship round. The headquarters for
this event was Glenroe GAA Club in County
Limerick. Shinnors/Mackarel organised a
120-mile route, a majority of which were in
the Ballyhoura and surrounding mountains.
The event began just to the north west of
the HQ, with the departure from checkpoint
1 (Tp1) in through the Fear Bréagach forest
for to travel to Tp2 on the R517. The
departure of Tp2 was turning right toward
Kilfinnane, before turning left into the
Ballyroe forest. Navigators had to be careful
to avoid passing by Tp4 on the way to Tp3
which was located back on the R517. After
departing Tp3, competitors had to re-enter
the forest for to reach Tp4. Following Tp4, it
was down for to enter the quarry in Keale
mountain for to arrive at all of Via 1 (V1),
Tp5 and V2. Despite three
checkpoints taking place in the same
quarry, Greg and the entire organising team
had the quarry laid out so that it was
relatively straight forward for to locate each
checkpoint. After leaving V2, it was over to
Ballyorgan to reach Tp6. Travelling to Tp7
located on the R512 just south of Ardpatrick
would be the last public roads, competitors
would use for a long while. Following Tp7,
the checkpoints became numbered in the
two hundreds, so after Tp7 was Tp201 etc.
Tp201 to Tp213 including V4 were all
located deep in the main Ballyhoura
mountain. (V3 was removed before the
event began). Tp213 was located on the
public road after exiting the forest in
Ballintlea North. Tp301 was up next, located
at the end of the road, and it was here that
the events first Speed Regularity Section
(SRS) began. The SRS was 8.4 miles long
and finished at Tp302 beside the Coolfree
forest northern most entrance. Tp302 was
where the nights first Supplementary Route
Instruction was received for to locate
Tp303. The route instruction received here
was in the form of a snake shaped
herringbone tulip diagram. Navigators first
had to plot the location of where the tulip
began, arrive there before they could begin
locating the first of four missing checkpoints
in a row. (Tp303, 304, 305, 306). Tp307
brought competitors back into the maze
that was the main Ballyhoura mountain, as
Tp308 and 309 were located beside Tp201
and Tp202 respectively. Tp310 was located
beside the western exit of the forest so
luckily for navigators, the location of it
wasn’t muddled in around previous or
future checkpoint locations. The halfway
point in the event was marked by Control B
(CB) at Ballyhay Cross Roads. Following the
midpoint Control competitors travelled up to
the filling station on the N20 for refuelling
and a chance for navigators to sus out their
route back through the Ballyhoura mountain
to reach the HQ in Glenroe GAA. The events
second SRS began immediately after the
fuel halt. Tp401 began the second half of
the event, so it was Tp402 that signalled the
end of the SRS and the imminent return to
the gravel tracks of the Ballyhoura’s for
everything between Tp402 and Tp419, a
section that included three Via’s and four
plot and bash checkpoints. Being out of the
main Ballyhoura mountain did not signal the
end of the forest gravel tracks however, as
the departure of Tp419 brought the event
into Coolfree mountain for to arrive at V8,
and now the named Tp501, 502 and V9.
After V9, the event travelled to the
Garryarthur forest for Tp503, then onwards
to two farms in Tulla for Tp504 and 505.
Tp506 was located back where Tp6 had
been and from here it was into the
Ardnageeha Keale Mountain for Tp507
followed by a newly created track into the
same quarry used earlier in the night for
Tp508 and 509. A short road trip down the
road brought crews to a farm at Smith’s
Cross Roads for V10 and the penultimate
C510. The final Control now just lay 300m
over the road in the
Glenroe GAA Club carpark.
When results were totted up it was
O’Regan/Butler who held a 14 penalty
(mark) win over second placed Ken
Carmody/James Fitzgerald.
Carmody/Fitzgerald will rue a wrong
approach penalty they received at Tp303, a
penalty that gave them 15 marks. Third
place went to the current national
championship leaders and clerks of the
course for the Midland Navigation Trial,
Ryan Treanor/Shane Dalton. In the classes,
Adam Coffey/James Dunphy finished 3 rd in
the Beginner class, Gary Kelleher/Séamus
McHugh finished 2 nd and Susan
Smyth/Brian Duggan finished 1 st . Derek
O’Donoghue/Tony O’Keeffe finished 1 st in
the Novice class. Stephen and Ray O’Neill
finished 3 rd in the Semi-Expert Class, with
Ruaidhri Nash/Brian Oakes finishing 2 nd
and Eoin Longworth/Declan Burke finishing
the class in 1 st place. Evin Hughes/Pakie
Duffy finished 3 rd in the Expert class, 2 nd
went to Treanor/Dalton and winning the
Expert was Carmody/Fitzgerald.
After the awards were presented, both
Aaron and Greg spoke a length about how
grateful they are for the plethora of
marshal’s who appeared on the night for to
man all the checkpoints during the event,
most of which were in the wilderness of the
Ballyhoura mountains and well off the
beaten track. Greg stressed how grateful he
is for the assistance he received from his
team and from Coillte in getting trees that
had fallen in the recent storm removed from
the forest tracks to allow cars to be able to
pass by. Regulations and Entry Forms are
currently available for the next round of the
National Navigation Championship, the
Skibbereen and District Car Club, 100 Isles
Navigation
Trial. The event is being organised by Colm
Feen and Barry O’Sullivan and will be based
out of the Tadgh MacCarthaigh GAA Hall in
Aughaville on Saturday night February 8 th .
Conor Mohan was competing in Finland over
the weekend. Conor and his driver, Eamonn
Kelly were using the Hotelli IsoValkeinen
SM-ralli Kuopio 250 v as a pre event test for
the opening round of the 2025 Junior World
Rally Championship, Rally Sweden, which
takes place from the 13 to the 16 th of
February. The pair were using a Ford Fiesta
Rally 3, similar to the one they’ll be using in
the Swedish event. The event comprised of
8 stages, totalling 96.5kms of snow and ice.
At the end of the event the pair finished 10
th overall and 4 th in class SM2
Oisín Sherlock