The hillclimb this weekend, what to expect.

Website office(Wexford)

John Dier & Karen O'Dowd

Tuesday 25th March

The National Sprint and Hillclimb Championship will get under way for 2008 with the running of the Wexford Motor Club Hillclimb weekend on the 29th and 30th of March.

The venue for the event will be in Barntown on both days, with the action getting under way on both days at 11am.

The paddock and service area will be on the old main road, just off the N25 at Barntown School and you can walk this area freely to view some of the fabulous machinery used for this discipline of motorsport.

The racing itself will start just above Larkin’s Cross and head towards Forth Mountain and competitors will be timed from a standing start through the flying finish approximately 1.2 miles up the hill. This will be a very demanding course and will test both driver and machine to the limit.

The weekend’s event will be a counting round of the Magnus Technology, Motorsport Ireland National Sprint and Hillclimb Championship and will be catering for all types of racing cars from the high powered single seaters, saloon racing cars to all the rally car classes. The battle for overall honours on the weekend should be fought out between the reigning Champion Paul O’Connell from Limerick and Galway man Frank Byrnes, who happens to be the current Northern Ireland Champion. Both these guys will be driving very fast single seaters but will be pushed hard by the likes of former National Champion Michael Roche from here in Wexford.

Other local drivers who should be fighting for top honours will be Pat Roche in his motorbike engine powered single seater, Peter Bogan in his Zakspeed MkII Escort and Brendan Harpur in his single seater. Peter Dwyer from Enniscorthy, a former winner in Wexford, should also be one to watch as he has bought himself a more powerful car for the coming season.

The event will also be a counting round of the Trident Engineering (Llanelli) 2008 Welsh Sprint and Hillclimb Championship and will, as always, bring a large contingent of competitors from Wales over for the event.

The Hillclimb is also rounds two and three of the Wexford Motor Club Championship. With entries expected from the current driver of the year, Damian Morris and lady driver of the year, Amanda O’Dowd it will be a battle to watch as current leader of the 2008 championship is the 2007 junior driver of the year, Richie Codd.

Remember, if you come out to spectate over the weekend that viewing will be free but we would ask you to obey the marshalls, who will be there to help run the event..

JD