Irish crew Ross Forde and Gary McElhinney will contest the famous Rally Isle of Man next Friday (10th July).

The Irish crew will be back in action in the opening tarmac round of the UK Fiesta Sporting Trophy in their Irish Sports Council and Motorsport Ireland backed Ford Fiesta ST across the hills on the 322-mile Douglas-based event.

They head into the rally following four runs across a more unfamiliar gravel surface and positioned very strong in 6th place with only 3points separating the top 5 positions in the one make British fiesta series.

This is not Fordes first time to the Isle of Man. After causing a stir last year with his impressive pace he will be one to watch this year down the narrow lanes of Newtown and Ramsey.

Co-driver Gary has never navigated across the Island stages before but insists hes not going to be fazed by the unknown territory and he is up for the challenge and looking forward to a good result. .

“We’re going to be going for it 100% and look for that first victory,” the 25-year-old said. “This is our first time this year on tarmac and we are really fired up for this one" " I really enjoy the narrow bumpy stages of the Isle of Man and i know it well so we hopefully should go well"

“The championship is still open and it’s going to be interesting what happens on the two tarmac rounds that are up next"

Going into the rally, Forde and McElhinney are sixth overall in the Fiesta Sporting Trophy and still within reach of the title.

This is the half way point of the season which Forde is competing in fully funded M-Sport run Fiesta. This funding is the prize for winning the Billy Coleman Award young rally driver of the year 2008.

The pair will start at number 62 and seeded third in the challenge category their M-Sport and Galway Mini Centre-prepared Fiesta ST.