Craig Breen has taken the lead of the Ypres Rally after overhauling Ott Tänak – who struggled on the second stage and dropped to third.
From third on the road, Belgian driver Thierry Neuville punched in a very competitive time on the cross-border Westouter – Boeschepe stage, the latter part of which runs onto French soil, only to be edged by his team-mate Breen.
Neuville started SS2 in second, 0.2 seconds ahead of Breen, but is now 0.7s behind in the same position overall after losing 0.9s on the stage.
Breen and Neuville are the only two World Rally Car drivers to have competed on Ypres before.
“I didn’t forget how to drive on this black stuff, Croatia [where he finished a subdued eighth] might’ve made me feel like it,” exclaimed an excited Breen.
“I have a car that’s working here for me, it feels like a little R5 with a little more power. Just class, I just love it.”
Neuville – the only one of the three dominant Hyundais to maintain position after the second stage – was not as ecstatic Breen but was still content despite “fighting like hell” with his glasses, which he said were slipping down his nose throughout the stage.
“I had a good clean run like the first stage, not too much cutting as it’s risky and we’re early in the race,” Neuville said.
Tänak, who impressed by winning the opening stage by 2.3s, missed a junction on SS2 but generally “struggled” across the stage.
He set the fifth-fastest time and lost 9.6s to Breen on the stage, meaning he dropped to 7.1s in the overall order.
Elfyn Evans was quicker than Tänak on SS2 but still 7s slower than the lead Hyundai, although he did beat his world championship-leading team-mate Sébastien Ogier.
Toyota driver Evans did say however that he was not “surprised” to be losing such a large amount of time to Breen and Neuville given his comparative lack of experience.
“If you know these stages for sure it can make a big difference,” he said. “It’s all very new to us.
“I’m trying, had a pretty decent run but there’s still places for sure I can be better.”
Photo: Toyota Gazoo Racing
Kalle Rovanperä is just 1.2s behind Evans in fifth overall, four seconds ahead of a downbeat Ogier in sixth.
“More [of a] clean drive but grip is very, very low, a lot of dust on the road,” said Ogier, who is running as the first car on the road. “I really struggle to go faster.”
Adrien Fourmaux moved past Takamoto Katsuta into seventh position, 0.9s ahead of the fourth Toyota, with his M-Sport team-mate Gus Greensmith another six seconds in arrears.
Greensmith has adopted a risk-free strategy but admitted “Craig [Breen]’s going f-ing fast” when he saw that his time was 18.2s slower.
“It didn’t feel so bad,” he added.
2C Competition’s Pierre-Louis Loubet rounds out the top 10 but suffered an overshoot at a tricky junction on SS2.
“I braked too late in a long left and I go straight, so my mistake. Sorry,” Loubet said.
SS2 times
1 Craig Breen/Paul Nagle (Hyundai) 10m35.3s
2 Thierry Neuville/Martijn Wydaeghe (Hyundai) +0.9s
3 Elfyn Evans/Scott Martin (Toyota) +7s
4 Kalle Rovanperä/Jonne Halttunen (Toyota) +7.8s
5 Ott Tänak/Martin Järveoja (Hyundai) +9.6s
6 Sébastien Ogier/Julien Ingrassia (Toyota) +10.7s
Leading positions after SS2
1 Breen/Nagle 18m26.9s
2 Neuville/Wydaeghe +0.7s
3 Tänak/Järveoja +7.1s
4 Evans/Martin +10.9s
5 Rovanperä/Halttunen +12.1s
6 Ogier/Ingrassia +16.1s
7 Adrien Fourmaux/Renaud Jamoul (M-Sport Ford) +24.7s
8 Takamoto Katsuta/Keaton Williams (Toyota) +25.6s
9 Gus Greensmith/Chris Patterson (M-Sport Ford) +31.6s
10 Pierre-Louis Loubet/Florian Haut-Labourdette (2C Competition Hyundai) +52.4s
