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West Kerry native Elaine Ní Shé is well-known for promoting motorsport on TG4 and Radio Na Gaeltachta.
KERRY Motor Club has become the first motorsport club in Ireland to gain 20×20 status.
20×20 is a nationwide programme to promote the active role women play in sports clubs all over Ireland, as competitors or on management and committee level.
The north-Kerry-based motor club will now work with the 20×20 organisation by setting out to reach the organisation’s three main targets. These targets are;
• A 20 per cent increase in media coverage of women in sport
• A 20 per cent increase in female participation at a player, coach, referee, and administrative level
• More attendance at women’s games and events.
Kerry Motor Club is already active in promoting women in motorsport, both as competitors and as committee members.
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In fact, in the early 1980s, the club ran a special stage on the Circuit of Kerry Rally which was staffed entirely by women marshals and timekeepers. This is believed to be the only time in the history of Irish motorsport that this happened.
Since then Kerry Motor Club has not rested on its laurels and continues to encourage Kerry women to get involved in motorsport. Current members include Katie Quinn, daughter of one of the club’s champion drivers Mike, won the ladies award in the 2019 Top Part West Coast Rally Championship.
Native Irish speaker and accomplished rally navigator Elaine Ní Shé from the West Kerry Gaeltacht promotes the sport through the Irish language on TG4 and Radio Na Gaeltachta.
Tarbert’s Megan Costello is the first third-generation rally competitor to represent Kerry. Her father Jason and her grandfather Joe are well-respected local rally drivers. Her neighbour Samantha Martin is Kerry’s only licenced motorcycle racer.
Michelle Walsh hard at work in the Rose Hotel Circuit of Kerry rally office
Family ties are not just reserved for the club’s competing members. It is fair to say that Michelle Walsh was born into the club. Her parents Kevin and Noreen are club stalwarts. Their only daughter has taken on many roles including office manager and rally secretary during busy national rally championship weekends.
Abbeydorney’s Linda O’Neill is an award-winning rally co-driver but also serves as the club’s child protection officer. Christina Fealy is the current club treasurer.
Christina Fealy and Emma O’Shea marshalling on last year’s Killarney Historic Rally.
Emma O’Shea encourages her daughter Kerry to get involved in club activities. Brenda Duffin and her daughter Ciara have both co-driven for their husband/father Eoin in rally events all over Ireland.
“Most club activities have been postponed for this year, but this gives us a great opportunity to take stock of where we are as a club and what we have achieved,” club Chairman PJ O’Dowd said.
“I’m proud to say that if you search into the past, present or future of Kerry Motor Club, you will find the names of many competitive and hard-working women at the backbone of our organisation.”
Kerry Motor Club treasurer Christina Fealy samples a Ford Escort rally car at the launch of the 2019 Rose Hotel Circuit of Kerry.
It is not just the current membership that has helped the club grow, Anne Talbot was one of the main organisers of the Circuit of Kerry rally in the late 1980s and early 1990s when the event formed a round of a UK championship. Friendships formed then ensure the rally is still popular with overseas crews today.
Local florist and club member Suzanne Raggett prepares the winning laurels for awards ceremonies and has done for years.
The sport’s national governing body Motorsport Ireland is one of many national organisations to hold 20×20 accreditation but, no other local-level motor club has been included in the scheme.
Club officials Eoin Duffin and Sean Hegarty with some of the key women behind Kerry Motor Club, Michelle Walsh, Christina Fealy and Noreen Walsh.
