Elfyn Evans has responded to Takamoto Katsuta’s Sunday morning challenge, grabbing back the lead of Rally Sweden with just one stage to go.
Katsuta had outpaced his Toyota team-mate by 7.5 seconds on the first pass of Västervik – the longest stage of the rally – to move into the lead by 4.5s.
Evans, who had led since Friday evening, however turned the screw on the second pass to win the stage by a massive 6.7s over Thierry Neuville, and retake the lead by 3.7s.
“I didn’t know how it went,” Evans admitted at the stop-line.
“It felt better [than the first pass] but, s***, I needed a response.”
Neuville holds a 3.3s advantage over team-mate Tänak in the battle for third
Katsuta looked dejected to learn he had lost so much to Evans.
“Yeah,” he sighed, “I was trying to be very clean, maybe I could push much more here.”
Neuville meanwhile beat his Hyundai team-mate Ott Tänak by 1.5s to strengthen his grip on third place. Just 3.3s splits the two heading onto the powerstage.
In the Super Sunday standings, Evans leads Katsuta by 3.7s with Tänak, Neuville and Kalle Rovanperä completing the top five.
