Sunday the 10th of April saw the West Cork Motorcycle Club(WCMCC) run their Annual Drag Race in Halfway, Ballinhassig. Those who turned out were in for an ideal day with hardly any wind and a fortune of sunshine. With 6 classes of bikes on the drag strip there was plenty for the crowd to watch and cheer for. There was no particular running order for the Practice and Qualifiers meaning that a 600cc road bike could come up against a professional Drag bike which made for great entertainment especially when the smaller bike came out on top against the bigger faster bikes. Following on from the qualifiers came the knockout rounds where bikes in the same class came up against each other , with the fastest proceeding to the next round. Swanton Motorcycle Accessories sponsored one of the two biggest classes, class C 401cc-600cc which saw great head to head battles between road bikes and race prepared bikes. It all came down to a well matched final between Declan Swanton and Paudie Keohane both on Yamaha R6 race bikes. It really came down to the wire with Paudie beating Declan by only a tenth of a second in a time of 10.387seconds.
Class F, 751cc-Unlimited was the biggest class of the day and was also a tight fight with Alan O Connor on his BMW RR up against Luke, “The Spook” Kingston on his Yamaha R1. Alan took his BMW to victory by a small margin of 0.26seconds. Alan was unbeaten all day and also set the second fastest time of the day which is a huge achievement.
Class B was a great class to watch with Paul Tobin on his Kawazaki ER650 and Ciaran O Callaghan on his Suzuki SV650 being the two favourites from the start of the day and neither let the side down with both riders appearing in the final. Ciaran got a great start and made the task harder for Paul who had already beaten him earlier in the day. It wasnt to be Pauls day being narrowly beaten by Ciaran at a time of 11.61seconds.
Class D was set for a battle between Noel Carey on a Suzuki GSXR 750 against Liam Keohane on a Honda VTR 1000. Liam didnt have a good start which gifted Noel an easy win.
Class E the Pre 98 bikes was to be an uncontested final with Ed McCarthy having a lone run on his Yamaha R1.
Then it all led to Class G also known as the Super Street Bike class which is full of super fast bikes. 8 bikes partook in this class with turbo, super charged and nitrous bikes. With all the power comes pain with some bikes just not performing as they were supposed to but for the bikes that did perform they gave a great show for the crowds. The final consisted of Craig Mallabone on his Suzuki GSXR 1300 Turbo against Denis Casey on his 1300 Super Charged Suzuki GSXR. This race did live up to expectations with Denis getting a better start than Craig but once they got into their stride Craigs bike had that bit more to get him over the line in 8.955 seconds and .8 of a second ahead of Denis.On speaking to some of the riders on the day they all confirmed that it lived up to their expectations and was a great day out.
When i spoke to the WCMCC representitive he was so thankful to the sponsors, riders, marshalls, race officials and to everyone who helped along the way and most of all to the fans who came out to support the club and riders. The next event on the calendar for WCMCC is the Munster 100 in August for more details, check out www.westcorkmotorcycleclub.ie
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