Motorsport Ireland has announced the updated Billy Coleman Award criteria for 2019, writes Richard Burke. The updates make no changes to the eligibility criteria of those considered for the prestigious prize but rather, focus on further developing those who are lucky to become nominated as well as slight tweaks to the judging windows.
The previous bi-monthly nomination periods have been replaced by tri-monthly nomination windows to better reflect the spread of events in the calendar. The months of January, February, March and April will count for 1 nomination while May/June/July and August/September/October will count for 1 nomination each. The nominees from these periods will be joined by the junior rally champions from the Irish National and Irish Forestry Rally Championships for both class 16 and 16A and the winner of the new dual surface J1600 Motorsport Ireland Junior Rally Series. One wildcard candidate may also be chosen by a panel appointed by Motorsport Ireland. This means there may be a maximum of 9 nominees in 2019, dropping to 7 in 2020 as class 16A will cease to exist at the end of this year.
All nominated candidates, who take up the offer to be interviewed for the Award, are eligible for inclusion in the Motorsport Ireland Rally Academy for 1 year. Additional support from the Motorsport Ireland Rally Academy as part of a training and development plan to further their careers will also be available in year 1 for the winner and they may apply for funding for a second year of support and delivering on the year 1 plan. The runners up (2) will receive support to compete in stage rallies at home and abroad up to an amount of €15,000 each, to be paid in stage payments as agreed. The funding for the Motorsport Ireland Rally Academy is made possible by the Team Ireland Foundation.
As mentioned earlier, the eligibility criteria for the award has remained the same for 2019. Those wishing to qualify must:
- Be under 26 years of age on 1st January in the year of the award.
- Hold a valid current competition licence issued by Motorsport Ireland.
- Be resident on the island of Ireland.
- Be competing at home or abroad in any type of car eligible for Motorsport Ireland rallies except WRC cars.
The full rule change is available to view in the “2019 YEARBOOK AMENDMENTS SINCE PUBLICATION” section onmotorsportireland.com under the “RULES & REGULATIONS” tab and the first 2019 nominee from the January-April window will be announced shortly. The current Billy Coleman Award co-ordinator is Sean McHugh.
