Monaghan Motor Club hosted the fifth round of the National Navigation Trial Championship last Saturday night. The event was also a counting round of both the club Navigation and Traders Championship, as well as the penultimate round of The Squealing Pig Border Navigation Championship. Clerk of the course Sean McCaffery assisted by Richard Cassidy laid out a 100 mile event covering a vast area of west Monaghan. The navigation took in the areas of Aghabog, Ballybay, Latton, Rockcorry and Drum village. Michael Tynan & Ciaran Tynan emerged victorious after a very demanding and challenging event, they completed the entire route only dropping 12 minutes. Considerably less than the time dropped by all other competitors. Darragh Kelly/Oisín Sherlock finished 2nd overall with Derek Mackarel/Conor Boylan finished 3rd. From Time Point 1 at Aghadrumkeen, competitors received their first plot & bash, a herringbone diagram which gave navigators their first of many headaches during the night. The tulip brought crews into a farm at Aghnacue. In the farm yard it was keep left and out the gravel lane and slot left across another lane hidden with grass and into TP2. The difficulty of this first section was evident from a total of twenty crews either dropping time or missing it altogether. At TP2 another p&b awaited, a second tulip diagram was handed out and this brought competitors back into the same farm again, this time going straight through the farm and along the disused railway. This section would claim the nights first victim in Pakie Duffy/Evin Hughes. They went down a lane parallel to the railway and unfortunately got stuck and burned out the clutch freeing themselves. This section was just as difficult as the first with twenty one crews dropping time or not arriving to it. A short breather awaited here in a road section before it was back into the rough and tumble on the infamous ‘grey’ lane at Corragarry which involved driving through the renowned flood and precision driving down the very bushy and twisty track to arrive at TP4. From here it was relatively straight forward with mostly public roads and some private lanes bringing competitors to Control B at Latton School. This brought an end to the first third of the event. At this point Darragh Kelly/Oisín Sherlock were out in front on 1 penalty from being a minute late into TP4. 2nd were Derek Mackarel/Conor Boylan on 2 penalties and in 3rd was the Semi-Expert team of Eoghan Corr/Shane Maguire down just 3 minutes.
The middle third proved to be the most difficult part of the navigation and ultimately decided the winning of the event. At TP17, the third p&b of the night was handed out. This would take crews from TP17 through Via3 to TP18. Just like before a herringbone diagram was issued. Unlike the normal herringbone, COC Sean decided to put his own spin on it, this time instead of competitors not taking the junctions appearing on the tulip, they had to do the opposite, something that was completely alien to navigators. As tough as it was most expert crews found Via3 in a farm yard at Creeve, just south of Ballybay without much difficulty. National championship leader Ryan Treanor unfortunately would miss Via3 and run into Tp18 with a wrong approach. The Cork pair of James Fitzgerald/Ken Carmody managed to get Via3 but went back onto the public road too quickly after resulting in a wrong approach at TP18. Another cork crew and National Championship contenders Derek Butler/Denis O’Donovan struggled here, they did eventually find Via3 but dropped 11 minutes into Tp18.
Plot and bash was also on the cards at Tp19 with navigators receiving a clock face tulip for Via4. Via4 was situated in Dixon’s farm at Drumhillagh. A newly opened lane deceived a lot of crews as they instead headed for the main farm entrance and a closed gate preventing entry to the farm. The confusion here led to most of the top seeds arriving to the Via at the same time, giving the marshal plenty of work to do. At the end of Dixons cow paddock lane was the pre-plotted TP20 and it was here that the final p&b of the night was handed out, for TP21 and Via5. Just like before, Sean didn’t make it easy on navigators as the tulip read from top to bottom unlike the normal bottom to top. It wasn’t until competitors arrived at the third instruction on the tulip that most navigators noticed the trick. When back on track the tulip brought crews to the famous Treanor’s farm at Corkeeran. Approaching the farm from the north, competitors had to turn into the cow lanes and approach the farm yard from the south. Disaster was to strike Kelly/Sherlock as they would receive a wrong approach at TP21. Right behind them Mackarel/Boylan would also get a wrong approach, but opted to skip the TP due to being down so much time. Michael Carbin/Conor Mohan, another team chasing the national title also missed TP21 such was the difficulty in finding it. When crews arrived at TP22 they breathed a sigh of relief as they knew they wouldn’t have to deal with anymore p&bs for the remainder of the night.
From TP22 it was a straight forward run into Control C and D at the filling station in Rockcorry for a quick refuel. There was a change in the leader board by this point. This time it was number 8 seed, Team Tynan out in front on 12 penalties. Kelly/Sherlock dropped from 1st to 2nd thanks to the wrong approach received at TP21. In 3rd place were Mackarel/Boylan despite missing the same Time Point. The final third wouldn’t throw up any drama for the top crews as the event mainly stayed on public roads, a welcome sight for all after the gruelling middle third. As the competitors arrived to the final Control in the Aghabog GAA centre, discussion immediately began as to who did what and who went wrong where, much to the amusement of Sean. At the end of the night, it was Michael and Ciaran Tynan who came out on top finishing on a total of 12. Kelly/Sherlock finished 2nd on 28 penalties despite their wrong approach and taking the wrong road at Aghnamullen crossroads not once but twice! Mackarel/Boylan finished comfortably in 3rd on 35 penalties.
In the classes, it was Kelly/Sherlock 1st Expert, Mackarel/Boylan 2nd and Martin Tynan/Fintan Clerkin 3rd on 52 pens. Semi-Expert was won by Shane Dalton/Ryan Treanor on 76 pens, 2nd was Mickey Conlon/Patrick Corcoran on 89 pens and 3rd was Damien Treanor/Cristopher McMahon on 115 pens. Aidan Keenan/Sean Marron were comfortable winners in the Novice class finishing on 62 pens, 2nd was the Cork pair of Garrett Collins/Eoin Tracey on 119 and 3rd was Cavan men Sean McConnell/Anthony McDonald, finishing on 138 pens. In the Beginner class, Ballybay men Elijah Dixon/Marco Lennon stormed to victory and also finished an outstanding 7th OA on 67 penalties. They arguably had the drive of the night punching well above their weight, beating many seasoned competitors in what was their second ever event. 2nd in class went to Patrick Shields/John Kelly on 259 pens and 3rd went to Elijah’s brother Abraham Dixon/Luke Connolly who finished on 301 pens.
Sean thanked all the residents and the landowners along the route for their support and allowing the event to use their land. He also thanked the marshals who came along and stood out manning the time points and his family for all the behind the scenes work done in getting the paperwork sorted and p&b’s measured up. The final round of the Border and National Navigation Championship’s takes place in Cavan on Saturday the 26th. Regs will be available shortly.
Top 10 Results:
1st Michael Tynan/Ciaran Tynan (Subaru Impreza) 12m,
2nd Darragh Kelly/Oisín Sherlock (Subaru Impreza) 28m,
3rd Derek Mackarel/Conor Boylan (Subaru Impreza) 35m,
4th Martin Tynan/Fintan Clerkin (Subaru Impreza) 52m,
5th Michael Carbin/Conor Mohan (Subaru Impreza) 53m,
6th Aidan Keenan/Sean Marron (Subaru Impreza) 62m,
7th Elijah Dixon/Marco Lennon (Subaru Impreza) 67m,
8th James Fitzgerald/Ken Carmody (Subaru Impreza) 68m,
9th Cathal McGlone/Patrick O’Leary (Ford Focus) 69m,
10th Shane Dalton/Ryan Treanor (Subaru Impreza) 76m.
