Takamoto Katsuta crashed out of Rally del Paraguay on the penultimate stage of Friday, as Adrien Fourmaux lost the lead due to a puncture.
Katsuta’s event got off to a bad start as he punctured on the very first stage and dropped over 45 seconds.
He had been glued in ninth position ever since, but was closing in on Josh McErlean’s eighth before he made a mistake on the second pass of Yerbatera.
Losing the rear of his GR Yaris Rally1 through a sweeping right-hander corner, Katsuta smacked the bank with the rear left which spun the car round and resulted in a right-hand-side impact as well.
With too much damage to continue, Katsuta parked his car on an access road and retired for the day.
There was better news for his Toyota team-mate Kalle Rovanperä though, who retook the lead from Fourmaux as the Frenchman collected a front-right puncture.
“It happened 3.5km before the end of the stage,” Fourmaux said. “There was a rock in the line after a crest and the car was already loaded. Immediately I was like ‘how many km?’ and next corner it was flat.
“But it’s OK, we are still second and it’s a long game.”
Rovanperä now leads the rally by 7.6s, with Ott Tänak now just 8.4s off the lead in third. Sébastien Ogier is up to fourth, overhauling Elfyn Evans on the stage as Thierry Neuville slipped to sixth after making a “stupid mistake” by braking too late right at the end of the stage.
Josh McErlean is seventh with Sami Pajari now two minutes off the lead and falling to eighth as he stopped to change a puncture.
“This time totally no idea [how it happened],” Pajari said. “But yeah, it’s a shame.”
