Daniel, co-driver Arthur Kierans and his team are delighted to announce that they have secured the highly coveted Pirelli Star Driver Award with the Scanbitz Ltd and Ravenol Motoroil supported Ford Fiesta R2 in the Sweet Lamb complex in Wales. This brilliant opportunity gives Daniel a fully funded drive in the 2014 British Rally Championship using the latest specification Citroen DS3 R3T. Also with a second competition in three days, the BRC Live Media Competition held at Prodrive in Banbury, Daniel once again impressed a panel of judges to become the winner and his prize is a test in a Mini JCW S2000 car early in 2014.
For the Pirelli shootout Daniel impressed a panel of five judges including BRC Managing Director Mark Taylor, motoring journalist Evan Rothman, Former Finland world Rally Clerk of Course Risto Laine, Citroën Racing’s Jean-Francois Lienere and former Subaru World Rally Team Engineer John McLean over a series of challanges designed to test all six nominees on key skills required to progress and be successful in their future rallying careers.
The first days tests were a Recce of the four mile timed stage to be used with WRC Co-Driver Chris Patterson aboard to examine each crews pacenote making, next was the Judges interviews where the drivers where grilled on their motorsport C.V.’s, followed by a TV camera interview for both Driver and Co-Driver with renowned rally commentator and presenter for the BBC, Mark James.
The second days test started with the drivers randomly choosing their running order for the timed stage they where to tackle before reversing the running order for a second run on the same test. This was followed immediately by a wheel change challenge on the Citroen DS3 R3T that was present from Davy Greer Motorsport with the final test consisting of a questionnaire exam for driver and Co-driver on their knowledge of motorsport regulations and technical details.
The judging panel found Daniel to be the deserving winner despite the very high standard shown by all of the nominees throughout the intense competition. Daniel, Arthur and the teams preparations where well thought and meticulous on the approach to the competition and the judging panel said that this was evident throughout all of the tests the competition threw at the nominees.
After receiving the fantastic news Daniel then made his way to Banbury in Oxfordshire to prepare for the BRC Live Media shootout where all nominees got a fantastic tour of the world famous Prodrive Museum as well as look at all of the facilities both for the racing and rally teams.
This was then followed by an interview in front of a panel of five judges which again included BRC Managing Director Mark Taylor, Neil Cloughney of SRG Media and BRC Live Radio, Paul Evans motorsport editor with The Sun, Rebecca Prosser Prodrive racing Media and PR and Paul Evans Prodrive Rallying Media and PR. They grilled all of the nominees on their Media and PR exploits throughout the season and in the future, their approach to enticing new sponsors and retaining current ones and their future plans and aspirations. Again the judges found Daniel to be the worthy winner and he can now look forward to the amazing opportunity of working closely with a world class team as he test the latest spec Mini JCW S2000 car in early 2014.
A clearly ecstatic Mc Kenna had this to say, “At the start of the year, I could never have imagined that we could win the Rally Two category, Fiesta Sporting Trophy, the BRC Live Media Award and the Pirelli Star Driver Shootout. It’s a dream come true. A lot of hard work and determination has been put in by me, Arthur and the team all year and it has been all worthwhile with the fantastic opportunities we have ahead of us. I would like to thank Pirelli and the Judges for the fantastic opportunity they have given me for my future career and also the BRC Live media team, Prodrive and the judges for the chance to test the Mini JCW S2000. Special thanks to Arthur, the service crew, sponsors, friends and families for all of the support throughout the season.”
Daniel has Wales Rally GB to look forward to now in his Fiesta R2 in mid November as well as availing of his prize for winning the Fiesta Sporting Trophey UK, a test in an R5 specification Ford Fiesta in early December. Daniel will let you all know how these events unfold with pre-event press releases so keep an eye on his website, danielmckenna.net. In the meantime keep up to date on Daniel’s Twitter and Facebook pages for any updates over the coming weeks.
