The Monte Carlo Rally or Rallye Monte-Carlo is a rallying event organized each year by the Automobile Club de Monaco. From its inception in 1911 by Prince Albert I, the rally was intended to demonstrate improvements and innovations in automobiles, and promote Monaco as a tourist resort on the Mediterranean shore. Before the format changed in 1997, the event was a “concentration rally” in which competitors would set off from various starting points around Europe and drive to Monaco, where the rally would continue to a set of special stages. The rally now takes place along the French Riviera in Monaco and southeast France.
Markko Märtin is a retired rally driver from Estonia, who competed in the World Rally Championship from 2000 until 2005.
Mark Johnathon Lovell was a British rally driver. He won the 1986 British Rally Championship in a Ford RS200 Group B, the 1987 and 1988 Irish Tarmac Rally Championship, the 1988 International Dutch Rally Drivers' Championship and the 2001 SCCA ProRally Drivers' Championship in the United States. He also won the 2003 Pikes Peak Rally only two weeks before his death.
Chris Atkinson is a professional rally driver. In the World Rally Championship (WRC), Atkinson drove for the Subaru World Rally Team between 2004 and 2008. His best finish on an individual WRC event is second, which he achieved at the 2008 Rally México and Rally Argentina. Other podium placings include third-place finishes at the 2005 Rally Japan and the 2008 Monte Carlo Rally.
The 1997 World Rally Championship was the 25th season of the FIA World Rally Championship. The season saw many changes in the championship. Most notably, Group A was partially replaced by the World Rally Car with manufacturers given the option which regulations to construct to. One inherent benefit to manufacturers by adopting WRC regulations was removing the need to mass-produce road-going versions of the cars that they competed with, under the previous rules for homologation. This meant that vehicles such as the Escort RS Cosworth and Subaru Impreza Turbo no longer had to be mass-produced for general sale in order to compete at World Championship level, and thus acting as a means of attracting increased competition and involvement by manufacturers. In the few years that follow, the Championship saw the added presence of WRC cars from companies such as Toyota, Hyundai, Seat, Citroën, and Peugeot, who would all compete under WRC regulations without having to manufacture equivalent specialised road cars for public sale. Both Ford and Subaru switched to WRC in 1997, except Mitsubishi who stayed with Group A to maintain the links to their Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution road cars. Subaru's transition was much more gradual for similar reasons with the early Subaru Impreza WRCs still largely Group A in nature.
Jan Kopecký is a professional rally driver from Czech Republic who drives for Škoda Motorsport. He is the 2013 ERC champion, 2018 WRC-2 champion as well as a multiple champion of the Czech Rally Championship
Guy Wilks is a British rally driver. Wilks started rallying at the age of 19, but currently drives for JRM in the FIA World Rallycross Championship. In 2011 Wilks drove for Peugeot UK in the Intercontinental Rally Challenge. In 2012 he did not compete.
Eugene Donnelly is a rally driver from County Londonderry, Northern Ireland, who races in the Irish Tarmac Rally Championship.
Andreas Mikkelsen is a Norwegian rally driver. He is currently competing in the World Rally Championship for Hyundai Shell Mobis WRT. He previously drove for the factory teams of Volkswagen and Citroën, finishing third in the drivers' standings in 2014, 2015 and 2016. His current co-driver is Torstein Eriksen.
Mads Østberg is a Norwegian rally driver. His co-driver is Torstein Eriksen.
Thomas Cave is a British rally driver. He is the son of club rally driver Peter Cave and his ambition is to become the next British champion in the FIA World Rally Championship. He is the UK's first minor international rally driver and achieved his international rally licence, issued in Latvia, at the age of 16.
Keith Cronin is an Irish rally driver and four-time winner of the British Rally Championship. He won the 2009 British Rally Championship in his first year in the series, defeating multiple champion Mark Higgins in his privately entered TTec Rally Prep Cronin Motorsport Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution IX. Cronin successfully defended his title in 2010 driving a Subaru Impreza. After missing the 2011 season, he returned to the Championship in 2012. He won three out of six events in his Citroen DS3 R3, meaning he won the overall title for the third time in his career. 2017 saw him crowned British Rally Champion for the fourth time.
Niall McShea is a rally driver. He won the Production World Rally Championship (PWRC) in 2004 in a Subaru Impreza WRX STI. He drove for the Proton R3 Rally Team in the Intercontinental Rally Challenge (IRC).
Craig Breen was an Irish rally driver who last competed part time for the Hyundai team in the World Rally Championship (WRC). He won the 2012 Super 2000 WRC, scoring class wins in the Monte Carlo Rally, Wales Rally GB, Rally France and the Rally of Spain. Breen won the WRC Academy Cup in 2011, winning his first event at the 2011 Rallye Deutschland and sealing the championship with a win at Wales Rally GB. The Academy title going down to the last stage, with Breen and Estonian rally driver Egon Kaur ending the season, both on 111 points, Breen then won the title on count back of stage wins, 39 to 14. Breen won the 2021 Rentokil Historic Rally in Killarney, Kerry, Ireland in his BMW M3 E30.
The Irish Tarmac Rally Championship (ITRC) is the premier rallying series in Ireland. It is held annually and is promoted by the Tarmac Rally Organisers’ Association (TROA). The Championship takes place over seven events, based in the Republic of Ireland and in Northern Ireland, using special stages, which are run against the clock, on closed public tarmac roads.
Anders Grøndal is a Norwegian rally and hill climb driver. His co-driver is Trond Svendsen.
Tim McNulty of County Meath, Republic of Ireland is a rally driver. Rallying in his Subaru Impreza S12B WRC, McNulty in the same 2011 season won both the Irish Tarmac Rally Championship and Ireland’s Dunlop National Rally in a historic motorsports first. In anticipation of the Todd’s Leap Ulster Rally earlier in the season, fellow rally driver Derrick McGarrity stated of McNulty “Tim is always a hard man to beat, very competitive and very committed, and he should have a slight advantage with his S12 Subaru which has the edge in power over the S11 I’m driving this time,”
The 2014 Circuit of Ireland was the fourth round of the 2014 European Rally Championship season, held in Ulster between 17 and 19 April 2014. The Circuit returned to the European Rally Championship over the Easter weekend, starting in Belfast, Northern Ireland. The Circuit of Ireland consisted of 18 special stages covering a total of 230 kilometres over the weekend.
The West Cork Rally, Clonakilty Park Hotel West Cork Rally is an annual motorsport tarmac rallying event held in Clonakilty, County Cork, Ireland. Promoted and organised by Cork Motor Club, the rally began in 1977 and has run on or near St. Patricks Weekend ever since with just a few exceptions. It is, according to a book about the rally's early history, an "important local cultural and economic event".
The 2021 FIA World Rally Championship-3 was the eighth season of the World Rally Championship-3, an auto racing championship for rally cars that is recognised by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile as the third-highest tier of international rallying. It was open to privately entered cars complying with Group Rally2 regulations. The championship began in January 2021 with the Rallye Monte-Carlo and concluded in November 2021 with Rally Monza, running in support of the 2021 World Rally Championship.
Callum Devine 
Northern Ireland