Takamoto Katsuta has stormed back past World Rally Championship leader Sébastien Ogier into fourth place on Rally Portugal as a half-spin blunted Ogier’s attack.
The Monte Carlo and Croatia Rally winner overhauled his Toyota team-mate Katsuta on Saturday’s opening test, heading into Cabeceiras de Basto 0.1 seconds ahead in fourth.
But a half-spin early onto SS10 hampered him and immediately cost him 6.8s to Katsuta through the first split, but the Japanese further extended his advantage on the stage to end it 10.3s quicker; now holding fourth place by 10.2s overall.
“This one I had a better feeling with the car,” Katsuta said.
“I spoke with my engineer a bit and we changed a bit on the car set-up. No big risks but still a good speed so I’m happy.”
Katsuta was fourth quickest on the stage as the leading three once again showed their prowess on Saturday morning.
Rally leader Ott Tänak was fastest by 4.8s – his fifth stage win from 10 this weekend – to extend his advantage further over Toyota’s Elfyn Evans to 18.3s.
“Let’s say the general feeling is better, this one maybe not as good we can improve for next loop but overall car is driving more smooth today,” Tänak said, echoing his comments from the previous stage.
Evans meanwhile edged third-placed Dani Sordo by a slender 0.1s, leaving 4.6s between the two crews ahead of the longest stage of the rally.
Hyundai driver Sordo is worried though.
“I was really bad with the tires, I used the soft tires and it was a big mistake,” he said. “I was working the tires really hard on the ground and I’m a little bit scared now for the tires.”
Photo: Jaanus Ree / Red Bull Content Pool
Katsuta, who lost 11.3s to the stage winner, is now 46.9s adrift of the lead with Ogier therefore close to a minute behind, trailing by 57.1s.
A sixth-placed and downbeat Kalle Rovanperä is increasingly slipping into no man’s land, unable to fight with his two team-mates up ahead as he struggles with an uncompetitive tire selection of three soft and three hard compounds.
“We didn’t have any soft from yesterday and we had to save one tire for tomorrow so that’s why we took three and three,” he reasoned.
Even though Ogier had his spin, Rovanperä was still slower on SS10 but he did at least nick 0.7s from M-Sport’s Gus Greensmith who was “struggling with the car a little bit”.
His Ford Fiesta WRC-driving team-mates Adrien Fourmaux and Renaud Jamoul worked on their throttle problem from the previous stage and cured it, outpacing road leader Thierry Neuville – who felt he had a “horrible” stage – by 23.7s.
Neuville is running hard tires all round instead of the optimum soft compound in a bid to save rubber for tomorrow and the powerstage.
Fourmaux said: “Honestly it was just a really, really nice stage to drive, maybe not the fastest I can do but I was just enjoying it a lot. The car is fun.”
Esapekka Lappi and Teemu Suninen were split by just 0.1s on SS10 in WRC2 but remain 14.5s apart in ninth and 10th places overall.
Lappi’s the man that won the stage and leads the rally, although he doesn’t feel completely at one in his Volkswagen Polo GTI R5. Incredibly though, Lappi and Suninen both lost just 0.6s and 0.7s to Neuville’s World Rally Car respectively on the stage.
Nikolay Gryazin had been trading the lead with his Movisport team-mate Lappi on Friday but a turbo problem, that is “getting worse and worse” leaves him over 30s behind the leader now and slipping into the clutches of Oliver Solberg.
Photo: Hyundai Motorsport
Solberg’s Hyundai i20 R5 was just 0.5s adrift of the class leader’s pace on SS10.
Mads Østberg deposed Marco Bulacia of fifth place as he continued his recovery drive from a puncture on Friday.
SS10 times
1 Ott Tänak/Martin Järveoja (Hyundai) 13m33.7s
2 Elfyn Evans/Scott Martin (Toyota) +4.8s
3 Dani Sordo/Borja Rozada (Hyundai) +4.9s
4 Takamoto Katsuta/Daniel Barritt (Toyota) +11.3s
5 Sébastien Ogier/Julien Ingrassia (Toyota) +21.6s
6 Kalle Rovanperä/Jonne Halttunen (Toyota) +22.3s
Leading positions after SS10
1 Tänak/Järveoja 1h48m50.4s
2 Evans/Martin +18.3s
3 Sordo/Rozada +22.9s
4 Katsuta/Barritt +46.9s
5 Ogier/Ingrassia +57.1s
6 Rovanperä/Halttunen +1m09.6s
7 Gus Greensmith/Chris Patterson (M-Sport Ford) +1m37.2s
8 Adrien Fourmaux/Renaud Jamoul (M-Sport Ford) +2m56.2s
9 Esapekka Lappi/Janne Ferm (Volkswagen) +5m06.8s
10 Teemu Suninen/Mikko Markkula (M-Sport Ford) +5m21.3s
