BY BRIAN McDAID
It’s late on Sunday evening as a left-hand drive VW Golf pulls into the car park.
This meeting was planned for Saturday evening but a puncture moved everything back.
I’m glad I got this puncture this week and not next PJ Mc Dermott Junior says as he looks down at his back rear wheel.
His car has a light covering of grim and brake dust from a weekend of reccing for the forthcoming Donegal International.
This is McDermott’s second Donegal International rally so he knows the recce is so important preparation for the three day event.
Over the weekend PJ and his navigator Johnny Baird have completed three runs over every stage at normal road speeds to gather as much information as possible on the route.
On the third and final run over the stage they use a phone in a bracket attached to inside of the windscreen to record the view from the car with his navigator Johnny calls their finished notes.
Over the next few days Mc Dermott will study the footage to familiarise himself with each stage. His VW that he done his recce in is left hand drive which will match his left hand drive rally car, a Peugeot 2008 Rally 4.
The wheel of his recce car has yellow tape wrapped around the wheel at equal distance from top dead centre. These are all a part and very accurate way of marking the difference in corners on the stage.
The puncture that PJ got on the recce at the weekend may have been caused by going to close grass verges on corners to see where they could cut into grass to keep the speed up. PJ would rather get a puncture this week and know about a sharp hidden rock this week and know about and mark it into the notes to avoid it come rally weekend.
McDermott has rallied since he was 17 starting off in a Toyota Ago before progressing to his present rally car.
PJ will compete twelve hundred cc three cylinder R4 front wheel drive turbo boasted Peugeot 2008 well over 200 bhp on tap, at this level it vital for this twenty year old Burt man to have the experience of Johnny Baird calling out the notes.
“Johnny knows when to push me and knows when to reel me in a bit. Everyday behind the wheel is a school day.”
The crew had ‘an off’ on this year’s Circuit of Ireland when trying too hard they clipped a bank braking the back axle.
“Some days you’ll get away with it, but on this occasion it wasn’t to be, but on the positive side it’s a good way of finding you limitations.”
PJ junior starts the rally running number 85 on the road his father local building developer PJ is also competing in the rally running number 69 in the road in his Ford Fiesta with Patrick Brides on the notes.
Both father and son service together with Kenny Mc Kinstry looking after his father’s car and Patrick Doherty looking after Junior’s car.
PJ junior is challenging for the lead in his class in the championship and a good result in this week’s Donegal could see him win the championship come Sunday evening.