The lead has changed hands once again on Rally Chile, as M-Sport Ford’s Ott Tänak moved past Hyundai’s Teemu Suninen on SS5.
Suninen entered the second stage of the Friday afternoon loop with a gap of 3.8 seconds to Tänak, and seemed totally unconcerned that he exited the stage 1.1s behind his rival.
Tänak was the fastest driver on the second pass of Rere with his unusual choice of soft tires on all four corners of his Ford Puma Rally1, heading Hyundai’s Thierry Neuville by 2.5 seconds. Neuville, like most others, was using a mix of hard and soft compound tires.
Suninen was third fastest, then Toyota pair Elfyn Evans and Kalle Rovanperä were 5.1 and 5.9 seconds off the pace respectively in fourth and fifth. Losing even more time was their team-mate Takamoto Katsuta, who had two huge moments but just about avoided the second one turning into a crash.
Evans remains in third place in the rally, now 6.2s off the lead, with Rovanperä 20.9s back in fourth. Neuville is only a further three seconds behind despite struggling all day, and he did not know why the Rere stage suited him more than others.
