Ott Tänak has stamped his authority on Rally Portugal on Saturday morning’s opener, outpacing the chasing pack by 7.5 seconds to more than double his lead over Elfyn Evans.
After taking the lead late on Friday when a stalled engine and fading tires blighted Hyundai team-mate Dani Sordo, Tänak began the day with six seconds in hand over Toyota’s Evans.
But the 2019 World Rally Champion wasn’t delighted, not feeling comfortable behind the wheel of his i20 Coupe WRC.
That all changed on SS9 Vieira do Minho as he blasted through the stage 7.5s quicker than next-quickest Evans to carve open a 13.5s lead.
“I had a good feeling in the stage, I was much more happy in the car today,” Tänak said. “It felt much more natural.”
Photo: M-Sport World Rally Team
Evans did at least put a bit more daylight between himself and third-placed Sordo, going 1.5s quicker to hold a 4.5s advantage overall.
Sordo said: “The middle of the stage I was a little bit lost as it was foggy and after I had small mistakes in fast places with pacenotes, but otherwise I push to the maximum.”
Sébastien Ogier has made early moves on the leaderboard, climbing up to fourth despite losing ground to the leading trio. His SS9 stage time of 12m53.2s was 11.5s slower than Tänak’s effort, and he lost 2.5s to Sordo too to lie 35.5s adrift of the lead and 17.5s away from the podium.
“I didn’t feel super comfortable, I was missing grip but same for everybody,” he said. “Maybe we need to see if we can do something with the car.”
Takamoto Katsuta lost 8.7s to his points-leading Toyota team-mate and therefore ceded his fourth position at the first time of asking, trailing Ogier by 0.1s overall.
“It’s OK I don’t follow that, of course he’s seven-time world champion,” Katsuta responded.
“But very hard this stage, very slippy, more than I expected. I tried to avoid mistakes but I obviously did a bit too much, too carefully.”
Kalle Rovanperä lost touch slightly with his illustrious team-mate too on SS9 but did feel he picked up “good experience” driving with “three plus one” tires; three softs and one hard.
The Finn did at least steal 1.8s from Katsuta, but he remains 11.7s behind overall.
After four top-three stage times on Friday, Gus Greensmith’s impressive Rally Portugal continued on Saturday morning as he threaded his Ford Fiesta WRC through Vieira do Minho in the fifth-quickest time, just 0.4s slower than Ogier on an equal footing.
The Briton is however still 26.9s behind Rovanperä in the overall classification.
Thierry Neuville returned to action after his accident late on Friday, running as the first car onto the stages.
The Hyundai driver elected to bolt hard compound Pirellis onto his i20 in a preparation of a big attack tomorrow. This, coupled to his road position, meant Neuville was over 30s slower than the SS9 benchmark.
“I’m on the hard tires so it’s a bit slippy, but I want to save my soft tires for tomorrow,” Neuville confirmed.
He was 15s quicker than M-Sport’s Adrien Fourmaux, 13.8s of which were gained through the first split of Vieira do Minho.
Fourmaux revealed his issue was throttle related: “The pedal is full throttle all the time so it was just undriveable, so I was just [driving] carefully as it was easy to make mistake,” he said. “It was dangerous.”
WRC2 had been a closely-fought affair on Friday, the lead swapping several times between Esapekka Lappi, Nikolay Gryazin and Teemu Suninen.
Photo: Jaanus Ree / Red Bull Content Pool
Lappi began Saturday 2.2s clear of his fellow Volkswagen Polo GTI R5 driver Gryazin but pulled some 15.9s clear on SS9, now lying 18.1s up overall.
Gryazin said: “Tire choice was not good but also I have some issue with the turbo. I’m not losing so much power but there’s something wrong.”
M-Sport driver Suninen lost 4.6s to his former colleague Lappi but did manage to leapfrog Gryazin into second. The Finn is 14.4s in arrears of Lappi after nine stages.
SS9 times
1 Ott Tänak/Martin Järveoja (Hyundai) 12m41.7s
2 Elfyn Evans/Scott Martin (Toyota) +7.5s
3 Dani Sordo/Borja Rozada (Hyundai) +9.0s
4 Sébastien Ogier/Julien Ingrassia (Toyota) +11.5s
5 Gus Greensmith/Chris Patterson (M-Sport Ford) +11.9s
6 Kalle Rovanperä/Jonne Halttunen (Toyota) +18.4s
Leading positions after SS9
1 Tänak/Järveoja 1h35m16.7s
2 Evans/Martin +13.5s
3 Sordo/Rozada +18.0s
4 Ogier/Ingrassia +35.5s
5 Takamoto Katsuta/Daniel Barritt (Toyota) +35.6s
6 Rovanperä/Halttunen +47.3s
7 Greensmith/Patterson +1m14.2s
8 Adrien Fourmaux/Renaud Jamoul (M-Sport Ford) +2m27.9s
9 Esapekka Lappi/Janne Ferm (Volkswagen) +4m14.2s
10 Teemu Suninen/Mikko Markkula (M-Sport Ford) +4m28.6s
