Elfyn Evans lost two minutes after rolling two corners from the end of Saturday morning at Rally Finland, as Mãrtiņš Sesks crashed out.
Evans had been second overall, chasing down event leader, Toyota team-mate and World Rally Championship rival Sébastien Ogier.
Ogier was 16.3s ahead of Evans at the start of the day, but after three stages on Saturday morning Evans had closed to 11.6s behind.
However the Welshman misjudged a left-hander right at the end of SS14 Leustu, rolling his GR Yaris Rally1 off the road.
The car landed on its wheels but in trying to escape, Evans nosed it into a ditch and had to rely on spectators to free the car before he could continue.
As a result he dropped to fifth overall.
“Just a corner was a little tighter than I expected with a ditch on the outside, I had it marked but just a bit too brave,” Evans explained. “We got stuck for a long time, that’s the bad thing.”
Ogier now leads the rally by 22.7s over Sami Pajari.
“We are on the edge all the time,” Ogier said. “This morning for me that was my plan – I knew they’d be pushing hard and I wanted this battle to happen because that’s how it’s fun, but I always try to keep this little margin and so far the plan is working.”
Sesks meanwhile had been fifth before SS14, repelling the advances of Adrien Fourmaux behind. But the M-Sport driver got off-line on a fast right-hander towards the start of the stage and crashed out spectacularly.
Fourmaux climbed two places to fourth as a result of the drama, with Oliver Solberg now in a podium position (third).
There was also drama in WRC2 as Roope Korhonen rolled out of second on SS13, leaving Robert Virves with a 34.2s advantage over Teemu Suninen.
