Elfyn Evans was left ‘kicking himself’ after Rally del Paraguay, as a conservative approach cost him 33% of his World Rally Championship lead.
Evans finished fourth last weekend, behind Hyundai’s Adrien Fourmaux despite having almost one minute in hand at the end of Friday.
The Welshman feels he was simply too cautious on Saturday, spooked by the tire trouble that hit nearly all of the Rally1 competitors during the opening leg.
“I think things started pretty well for me, really, on Friday,” Evans told DirtFish. “Things were working well, and obviously we had all this tire drama, and I think what really happened was I went too conservative.
“I was already driving quite in the middle of the road, everything quite tidy, but then I just went too conservative basically in that moment and fell into a really bad rhythm on the back of that, I feel like.
“I just think with everything that went on with the tires on Friday, I probably went too conservative then on Saturday.”
Toyota team-mate, and closest title rival, Sami Pajari meanwhile won the event to reduce Evans’ points lead from 30 to 20 points.
“When you look back now, of course you kick yourself for what we did on Saturday morning and some of the stages even on Saturday afternoon still being a bit too much on the careful side,” Evans added.
“But you know, it’s a what-if game in rallying and we got some points out of it. Of course, I’m disappointed. But, you know, we have to move on to the next one.”
