The winners of the 'Young Driver of the Year', a cheque for £25,000 and the prestigious Dunlop Sexton Trophy, and the Billy Coleman award for the 'Young Rally Driver of the Year' will be announced today at the Alfa Romeo and Motorsport Ireland Awards for Excellence in Irish Motorsport function in Dublin's Westbury Hotel.
The three finalists for the 'Young Driver' are Michael Devaney (Rathfarnham), Paul Sammin (Louisburg, Co Mayo), and Charlie Donnelly (Naas). And the three finalists for the Billy Coleman award, a cheque for £20,000 and free entries for all rallies run under the control of Motorsport Ireland in 2002, are: John Carroll (Danesfort, Co Kilkenny), Stuart Darcy (Bruckless, Co Donegal) and Adrian McElvaney (Monaghan).
John Carroll has had a very successful season, winning the Ford Ka Challenge and the South East Rally Stages Championship. Carroll has won the Ka title with a score of 196 points, but there will be quite a battle for runner-up in Sunday's final round at Mondello Park between Barry Barrable on 144 points, Gerry Keyes on 143 and Declan Magee on 141. Denise Ryan of Athy is the leading woman driver, joint fifth with Andrew Hegarty on 110 points.
A new motorcycle road race is added to the southern calendar in 2002 for April 27th-28th. The venue is at the village of Athea in south-west Limerick, close to the Limerick-Kerry border.
Moves are being made by the newly formed South Tipperary MCC to revive the Faugheen road races near Carrick-On-Suir, which ran from 1976 to 1986.
