Oliver Solberg’s Rally Estonia lead has grown to 11.9 seconds, but Adrien Fourmaux set the pace on the afternoon’s first stage.
A sensational morning earned Toyota Rally1 debutant Solberg an 8.5s advantage over Ott Tänak after five stages in Estonia, but the tempo switched up for the afternoon.
The first pass of Kambja – which is immediately repeated two hours later – introduced a far more severe cleaning effect, which hampered those at the front.
That meant despite not having the perfect stage, Solberg extended his lead by 3.4s over Tänak.
“I did so many small mistakes, it was so slippy,” Solberg said. “Not the best, but learning.”
Solberg has either been fastest or second fastest on every stage so far on Friday
Tänak’s time however impressed his team-mate Thierry Neuville, who was just 0.4s faster but two cars further down the road order.
Neuville moved ahead of Kalle Rovanperä and into a podium place, holding the Finn to a 2.5s deficit.
The third Hyundai of Adrien Fourmaux was the one that set the pace though – the Frenchman changing many things at service to unlock the speed that had been missing in the morning.
He was 3.3s faster than second-fastest Solberg.
“We did some big steps in service, and I don’t recognize the car to be fair,” Fourmaux said. “That was really nice to drive this time. That’s a good one – I was enjoying so much.”
Asked what he changed, Fourmaux smiled: “We changed many different things like differential and ride height, other stuff that I forget but it’s OK!”
Sami Pajari’s Toyota is back to full health after a sticky handbrake mechanism slowed him in the morning.
