Tohill achieves surprise second place at Euro RX season warm up

Former double FIA European Rallycross Champion Derek Tohill won the Supercar category and finished second in the Superfinal at the final round of the 2015 Irish Rallycross Championship, held at Mondello Park (November 22).

The PFCRX driver raced the team’s recently acquired Olsbergs MSE built Ford Fiesta Supercar for the second time, having claimed victory on the freshly rebuilt cars maiden run with team at the penultimate round of the series.

During the day, Tohill won all three of the Supercar heats to qualify on pole position for the Supercar final, which he led from lights to flag. Some issues on the start line of the Superfinal resulted in the Fiesta stalling, which allowed the other cars to get away, but Tohill fired the engine back up and delivered the drive of the day. During the six lap final, Tohill had to hunt down the entire field and much to the delight of the large crowd, there was a grandstand finish. In a dash to the line, Tohill just missed out on victory to Noel Greene (Mitsubishi Evo) by less than a second.

The last two rounds of the Irish Rallycross Championship have provided a valuable learning ground ahead of next season in the FIA European Rallycross Championship for the PFCRX team. Tohill even managed to finish second in the overall IRX Championship without having competed in all rounds, which was an unexpected bonus.

The PFCRX team now turn its attention to preparing for the start of the 2016 FIA European Rallycross Championship over the winter months, which gets underway at Mettet, Belgium  next spring (May 14-15). The Fiesta’s full livery and 2016 programme will be revealed in the New Year.

Derek Tohill | Driver | Ford Fiesta #11

“It was a great learning day for us at Mondello Park. The heats and Supercar final all went very well. We did run into a few simple issues, so the event was very valuable testing ahead of next season in the European Championship. It’s nice to test in public, especially at home in Ireland.”

“Overall I had lots and lots of fun all day, I just love driving the car so much. It was great to get more seat time under my belt, and we improved our lap times on our previous time at Mondello by more than a second per lap. We will continue to work hard with the car and our infrastructure over the winter to prepare for 2016, the team is getting to know the car well and they did a good job preparing it for this weekend. We’re very happy to be working with partners such as OMSE and Mountune, it’s great to work with such professional outfits.”

Mondello Park IRX Results | November 23rd

Superfinal
1 Noel Greene – Mitsubishi Evo
2 Derek Tohill – Ford Fiesta
3 Padrig Leeson – Vauxhall Corsa

Supercar final
1 Derek Tohill – Ford Fiesta
2 Noel Greene – Mitsubishi Evo

Image from Sarah Byrne.