Thierry Neuville has retired from Rally Japan after suffering a third technical issue in as many days.
The reigning World Rally champion’s event has been beset by issues; on Thursday he had a transmission problem and the rear differential on his Hyundai i20 N Rally1 broke on Friday morning.
Saturday got off to an even worse start: on the road section from the service to stage eight, the day’s first stage, his i20 started leaking oil, with Neuville and co-driver Martijn Wydaeghe inspecting the car before setting off into SS8.
A radio message from Hyundai team manager Pablo Marcos indicated Neuville had suffered a driveshaft failure. There is no midday service in Saturday’s itinerary, so would have needed to carry the issue through the entire day or park up and retire.
Problems had already begun for Neuville on the road section
Neuville completed the Obara test at a reduced pace but decided he would take the latter option.
“I don’t know,” Neuville shrugged when asked what caused the driveshaft problem. “I don’t know what to say. We will investigate and probably go back to service now.”
Neuville had fallen to eighth, 14.8s behind Grégoire Munster, prior to his retirement after SS8.
Elfyn Evans made an important start to Saturday’s action, reducing his projected points loss to title rival Sébastien Ogier by taking second place from his Toyota team-mate Takamoto Katsuta.
“There was more pollution coming than expected,” said Katsuta, who was 3.2s off the leading pace. “It felt OK but maybe [I was] not committed enough on tricky pollution sections.”
Evans’ advantage over Katsuta is a slim 0.6s.
Though Neuville is out, Saturday’s first stage wasn’t all doom and gloom for Hyundai: the team won its first stage of the rally thanks to Adrien Fourmaux’s scratch time on Obara.
Fourmaux’s advantage over Sami Pajari in their battle for fourth is extended to 1.9s by the Frenchman’s stage win.
