Murray focused on saloon career

Motorsport: The massive stumbling block for young Irish racing and rally drivers in their quest to establish a professional career is lack of funding. Without major sponsorship it is virtually impossible to break into the big time, where fame and fortune on the grand scale is only achieved by the multi-talented and privileged few.

Eoin Murray (Dublin), winner of the Motorsport Ireland Young Racing Driver of The Year Award, is not being lured by the hype and money of Formula One. He is well aware that it requires a huge budget to be competitive in Formula 3 which is the recognised route to Grand Prix racing, and he also knows that the alternative formulae are rather a dead end. Murray (20) is concentrating instead on a career in saloon car racing.

Murray's ultimate aim is a professional drive in the British Touring Car Championship, but his most likely route for 2004 is the European Alfa Romeo Championship.

Graham Quinn, one of the finalists in the Young Rally Driver of The Year/Billy Coleman Awards scheme, is to contest the new Fiat Stilo Cup which will run concurrently with the British Rally Championship next year.

Dublin photographer Frank Fennell scored another classic event success in the recent RAC Rally of The Tests in the UK. Earlier this year, with navigator Kevin Savage (Lancashire), Fennell won both the Monte Carlo Challenge and the Dutch Winter Trial to Monaco. Fennell has won 16 classic events in the UK and Europe, and will bid for another Monte Carlo win in January driving a Mercedes-Benz 300SE.

MOTORSPORT IRELAND HEWISON TROPHY AUTOTEST CHAMPIONSHIP (after round 8 of the 16 rounds series): 1 - Eamonn Byrne (Mini Special) 198 points; 2 - Eddie Peterson (Mini Special) 184; 3 - Paddy Power (Mini Moke) 174; 4 - Sam Johnston (Mini Special) 161; 5 - Paul Phelan (Mini Special) 147; 6 - Liam Cashman (Toyota Starlet) 135; 7 - Chris Grimes (Mini) 131; 8 - Ian White (Mini) 119; 9 - Frank Lenehan (Vauxhall Nova) 118; 10 - Simon Echlin (Westfield) 98; 11 - Christopher Evans (Westfield) 96; 12 - JJ Farrell (Mini Special) 93. The series resumes with the Midland MC's event on January 4th, 2004.