AT THE Sligo half of the AA Circuit of Ireland, around 10 o'clock last night, there was no significant change on the leaderboard. Bertie Fisher and Rory Kennedy led by a massive margin of two minutes 40 seconds with the big battle going on for second place between James Cullen/ Ellen Morgan and Austin McHale/Brian Murphy, the two cars separated only by seconds.

Fisher, in the extremely impressive Subaru Impreza 555, set out from Sligo not only with a dominant lead but in extremely confident mood to tackle the final seven stages. After leading from the start it would indeed be a cruel quirk of fate if Fisher and Kennedy were robbed of their second Circuit victory.

The Dunlop stages on Easter Saturday saw Fisher extend his overnight lead from Friday, but Stephen Murphy and Eamonn Boland were overtaken by the hard charging Cullen, and McHale overhauled Liam O'Callaghan to take over fourth as Boland slipped back to sixth.

Fisher had put his stamp on the rally right from the start and as the cars left Tallaght yesterday morning, the Ulsterman was looking good for a repeat of his win of 1995. McHale was on a charge, fastest of all on cumulative times over five stages between Mullingar and on towards Sligo at nine minutes 48 seconds, just a second quicker than O'Callaghan and the hard charging Boland.

Up front, Fisher was taking it relatively easy pacing himself with five seconds to spare over Cullen over that stretch. Murphy did not carry out a comprehensive reconnaissance of the stages and paid dearly, under threat from Boland.