Dempsey does double at Irish GP

The inaugural Irish Grand Prix was held over the weekend at the St.Annes track in Dublin where Keith Demspey took double victory winning both the 1:10 Electric and Nitro categories. Heading the entry for the event hosted by the country’s main onroad club, ORCA, was reigning British Champion Kyle Branson who duly went onto TQ the 1:10 nitro class with his factory Sirio powered Serpent. Unfortunately rain arrived after the first round of qualifying and the remainder of the racing would be run on a wet track.

In the 30-minute 1:10 nitro final Branson looked on target for the win but 10-minutes in he suffered a radio glitch which sent his car crashing into the pit wall and into instant retirement. This allowed Keith Dempsey, who was making a welcomed return to nitro racing with the new Serpent 733, to take over the race lead. Setting the fastest lap of the race he went on to win by a 2 lap margin over young British visitor Alex Thurston’s Kyosho giving the 733 victory on its Irish debut. In the electric class it was Dempsey who took his Tamiya TRF416 to TQ honours over the Schumacher of Graham Kenny. In the final Dempsey was easily able to convert his number one starting position into victory claiming the win over the father & son pairing of Gary and Tom Jess who were both at the controls of Schumacher Mi4s. Unfortunately with the majority of the 1:8 runners not wanting to run in the damp conditions due to an up coming National round the result was declared on qualifying. Having taken his Shepherd Velox to the TQ honours Ian Campbell, one of the drivers happy to race on the wet track, was declared the winner over the Serpent’s of Michael Byrne and Darragh Fox.

Source: Hobbies Ireland [hobbiesireland.ie]