O’Riordan secures four-in-a-row in ‘20’

The Acesigns Cork 20 International Rally, the final round of the Clonakilty Blackpudding Irish Tarmac Championship, resulted in a record-breaking four-in-a-row victory for Midleton’s Daragh O’Riordan and his Derry co-driver Tony McDaid (Ford Fiesta WRC).

Their winning margin of three minutes and 49.4 seconds over the Citroen DS3 R5 of Ballylickey’s Keith Cronin and Fermanagh’s Marshall Clarke masked an interesting dice between the two crews through Saturday’s stages.

Cronin marked the Irish debut of the Citroen DS3 R5 in the best possible fashion. On the opening 23-kilometre stage just outside Millstreet, he punched in the fastest time to lead O’Riordan by 8.2 seconds. Any chance Sam Moffett harboured of catching the Cork pair dissipated with steering troubles. Cronin admitted to backing off on the closing section of the second stage at Coolea, where O’Riordan pushed hard to move into a 1.5 second lead.