Ott Tänak has taken a narrow early lead on Rally Poland, heading a Hyundai one-two with Thierry Neuville close behind.
A determined Tänak is determined to take his first Poland victory after two near-misses in 2016 and 2017 and got off on the front-foot, winning the 1.6-mile Mikołajki Arena stage.
Neuville and the lead Toyota of Elfyn Evans are separated by 0.3s after being paired together for the final Rally1 run. The championship leader predicted that Friday is “going to be crazy, that’s for sure,” not helped by his position as first car on the road.
Takamoto Katsuta, Hyundai’s third driver Andreas Mikkelsen and the lead M-Sport car of Adrien Fourmaux completed the top six, all within two seconds of Tänak’s benchmark.
Reigning world champion Kalle Rovanperä cut a frustrated figure in seventh place. He’d lost only 2.1s to the rally leader on the opening test but, acting as a last-minute stand-in for Sébastien Ogier after his team-mate’s withdrawal following a recce accident, Rovanperä was not looking forward to driving without proper preparation.
“It’s super-annoying,” said Rovanperä. “You come here to have a good finish but when you drive it’s s*** if you don’t try to win. For sure I don’t try to win this time, there is no point, we are just too late with everything.
“Tonight will be a super-long night,” he added, indicating plenty of hours studying stage videos lay ahead.
Kalle Rovanperä faces a long Thursday evening trying to catch up on studying videos and tweaking pacenotes, having only known he'd be competing two days before the rally start
Grégoire Munster was seventh but also frustrated, in his case due to loose stones being kicked up and damaging his windscreen. He climbed out of his Ford Puma at the finish to inspect the damage before making his feelings known.
“When they say they put water, they should do it properly,” said Munster. “It’s way too dry and we get projectiles on the car. My windscreen is not completely f*****, but tomorrow if we get big impacts, it’s going to be worse. It’s stupid.”
Mārtiņš Sesks kicked off his Rally1 debut, driving a Ford Puma that is carrying ballast in place of the hybrid unit used by his class rivals, was 3.7s off the pace in ninth.
Oliver Solberg dominated the opening stage in the WRC2 support category, beating the rest of the field by 1.6s in what was otherwise a battle of fine margins between those behind.
He had been paired against Sesks in the Mikołajki Arena’s two-lane duel format, which meant his Škoda Fabia RS Rally2 suffered a bit of a battering in the opening turns.
“I’ve got two cracks in my windscreen because I drove against a Rally1 car, which smashed my windscreen with gravel,” said Solberg. “It’s not easy, a lot of gravel and dust on my side, but it doesn’t matter.”
