With just seconds to go before he was due to head off, Takamoto Katsuta emerged from the darkness, phone in hand.
Flashlight activated, he aimed for the #1 Hyundai i20 N Rally1 to discover the reigning world champion had gone for a different strategy.
The Belgian had shunned Katsuta’s choice of a studded winter and supersoft cross in favour of four Hankooks of the spiky variety.
Unquestionably, hindsight would prove Neuville’s selection to be the best choice – certainly on that opening stage of Sunday at 0645. Within a mile of the start, Katsuta had slid off and beached his Toyota in a hedge.
Team-mates Sébastien Ogier and Elfyn Evans had gone for four studs, and would finish the rally first and second.
Katsuta had been feeling unwell in the lead up to the season opener
Katsuta’s Monte Carlo had been something of a damp squib anyway – a stage win on Saturday a definite highlight on a weekend where Katsuta was badly under the weather and struggling for form.
Given the pressure that’s on the Japanese this season, ending round one in a hedge was the last thing he could really afford. But Toyota team principal Jari-Matti Latvala doesn’t want to park all the blame at Katsuta’s door.
“I little bit blame myself because I should have pushed him to take four studded tires – also the same for Sami [Pajari],” Latvala told DirtFish.
“For me, they went a little bit too brave a choice because we knew that it’s going to freeze, that after the safety crews have passed the stages, it will start freezing and we knew that’s the situation.
“We managed to convince Elfyn and Séb to take the safer choice but I should have pushed more for Taka and Sami. And I think that was maybe too risky a choice for both of them.”
With Sami, I think it was also too much speed.Latvala on Pajari's Monte shunt
Pajari also crashed on the same stage albeit much further in, getting it wrong on a downhill braking over a bridge and falling off the edge, dropping into a small ditch beneath.
Latvala feels four studded tires would have prevented Katsuta’s mistake, but Pajari was simply too committed.
“With Sami, I think it was also too much speed,” he explained. “A place like that coming over the bridge, which is always, you know, icy.
“I think that was also, with Sami, a little bit of a new experience to learn that the bridges are always very icy and slippy in Monte Carlo. I think he has never been in the conditions like that, so it’s something for him to also learn with experience.”
Even for a first Monte in a top-class car, Pajari’s performance had been subdued before the accident as the Finn failed to trouble the top stage times on a weekend seven different drivers won stages.
“Yeah, he started very carefully and he was stepping up and he was getting better and faster, which was good,” Latvala said.
Pajari had been running in a distant seventh place before his off on Sunday morning
“At the end, you know, we spoke with him that it doesn’t matter the result so much – once you get the good feeling and try to finish the race, then you will be more comfortable in Sweden. But OK, it didn’t happen this time, so now we just need to start Sweden from zero.
“But anyway, this is a learning year for Sami, and we are here to collect the experience. These things are part of the learning curve, and once you come here next year, I think then he knows a lot more.
“But let’s say that now in Sweden, I think he will be more comfortable on more on comfort zone, driving those conditions.”