Bertie Fisher remembered

Bertie Fisher was the man of Irish rallying. And that made him the man of Irish motorsport.

Irish racing, held at Mondello Park and Kirkistown, is much more low-key than anything found at Silverstone or Brands Hatch. But when the roads were closed and Bertie and his rivals hit the rally stages, thousands - tens of thousands - hung off every vantage point to catch a glimpse of the action.

I was among them. As a boy, events like the Circuit of Ireland and the Ulster International Rally were compulsory viewing. Screaming BDA-engined Mk 2 Escorts, wheel arches stretched to the point where they barely squeezed down the narrow lanes, fuelled my passion for motorsport.

And Bertie was at the heart of it all. I watched his first international win on the 1981 Ulster and reported on his Rally of the Lakes success in 1996, as well as his second Circuit of Ireland victory the following year.

That Killarney win sticks in my mind. Bertie spent most of the opening day pursuing Liam O'Callaghan, an ambitious local ace at the wheel of a Toyota Celica GT-Four. It was tense, nervy stuff as each driver retaliated on consecutive stages. And all the time, Sunday morning's run over Moll's Gap - nearly 13 miles of classic Irish rallying terrain - was looming in the distance.

Moll's has it all. The first few miles is big-balls territory, just about flat if you're feeling brave enough. Then there's a notoriously twisty, bumpy climb to the Gap itself, where hundreds of fans cheer the cars between two rock faces. That's followed by another blindingly fast section, flanked by ditches, fence posts and foot-high banks.

I waited at the flying finish as Liam arrived, posted a time of 10 minutes and 14 seconds, and peered into his rear-view mirror to see if Bertie was on his way. A flash of blue Impreza was all the young Cork man needed to see to realise he'd been had. He pulled away a broken man, resigned to defeat.

Bertie arrived at the control more pumped than I'd ever seen him. He was so keen to get onto the next test that he accidentally bumped the Impreza forward and clouted a rival tyre engineer who was studying the form. Then he saw the time, and smiled. Nine minutes, 59 seconds. He was the first man under ten minutes.

The morning after that remarkable win - and a heavy celebration with Bertie in the bar - I put my hangover in the boot of my hire car and drove over the Gap. I can still scarcely believe that he covered it in under 10 minutes.

It was typical of Bertie to let his driving do the talking because he was a man of relatively few words. Open, honest and entirely down-to-earth, despite the financial comfort that his hard work at the family company brought, he had little time for pontificating or empty talk. His annoyance at the protracted legal battle over victory on the 1998 Circuit of Ireland (a fight eventually won by Austin McHale) had as much to do with the famous event's name being muddied than any personal loss.

Wasn't a great one for pre-event spin either. His rivals, he reckoned, knew the odds. His name on the entry list meant he was there to win, because he didn't know any other way. This was a man who didn't know the meaning of the word 'second' - in life, in business, in sport.

Writing this, I still find it hard to believe that Bertie Fisher is no longer with us. In the 20 years he spent at the top flight of Irish rallying, he touched fans, journalists, sponsors and fellow competitors with brilliant driving, his dry sense of humour, compassion and professional attitude. The effects of his passing will be felt well beyond the shores of the Emerald Isle. Rallying as a whole will miss him terribly.