Thierry Neuville clinched his first ever Rallye Monte-Carlo victory after an epic contest as Elfyn Evans lost second place to team-mate Sébastien Ogier on the powerstage.
Neuville beat Ogier on the powerstage by less than a hundredth of a second to secure a rally winning margin of 12.6 seconds. Evans lost 3.1s to team-mate Ogier on the concluding La Cabanette / Col de Braus test to lose second place by a slender 1.7s.
As early as Thursday night, the Hyundais of Neuville and world champion Ott Tänak were immediately embroiled in a battle with Toyota’s new recruits Ogier and Evans. But on Friday’s second stage, Tänak spectacularly exited the contest when he flew off the road at high-speed after an awkward compression unsettled his i20 WRC.
Miraculously, Tänak and co-driver Martin Järveoja walked away from the accident unscathed but it was the worst possible start to their title defence with no points on the board.
Tänak’s demise was a mere subplot in relation to the pulsating battle at the front, though.
Ogier led on Friday night but team-mate Evans was just 1.2s behind with Neuville also looming large.
The fight continued on Saturday with Evans and Ogier drawing level halfway through the day, but it was Evans who pulled clear to lead on Saturday with just 6.4s splitting the leader and Neuville in third.
Neuville defused the hype with a dominant display on Sunday to win all four of the day’s tests to push his weekend total up to nine stage wins from a possible 16.
With Ogier second fastest on the powerstage, Neuville has opened up an eight-point lead in the championship.
“We had an incredible feeling on the last couple of days so we were able to catch back the time,” said the winner. “It was a tough weekend but I am really happy to have done it. We showed the performance this weekend so it’s great to start the season like this.”
“I think we can be happy with this start of the season,” Ogier admitted. “There’s still some way to go to extract all the potential from this car but I enjoy it so good weekend.”
Evans was “disappointed” to have missed out having led for much of the rally, but it was an eye-catching performance from the Toyota debutant.
“We were happy until last night, [I] can’t say I’ve been happy today,” he said. “A bit disappointed really, [it] just hasn’t really clicked today. A bit of work to do but still a good weekend.”
Esapekka Lappi took a fine fourth place on his M-Sport debut; scarcely believable considering the position the team found itself in on Thursday night. All three cars were off the pace as they suffered water temperature issues caused by leaf-infested front grilles.
Lappi spent Friday frustrated by his performance but managed to find his feet on Saturday afternoon and applied enough pressure onto Sébastien Loeb – who wilted on Sunday morning.
That elevated Lappi from fifth into fourth, which he described as a “really good season opener.” He added: “I learnt a lot from the car this weekend which is important for the future.”
Loeb’s misjudgement of a right-hander on SS14 capped off a disappointing rally for the nine-time world champion.
Jumping from fifth to fourth after Tänak crashed, Loeb slipped back into Lappi’s clutches with a spin on Saturday afternoon before his brush with disaster on SS14 put the nail in the coffin. Loeb “destroyed a tire” when he slid his Hyundai off the road and fell behind Lappi. Limping through to the end thereafter, Loeb eventually finished a distant sixth behind Kalle Rovanperä.
“It didn’t go very well for us. For sure it was not my best rally, we really struggled a lot this weekend,” said the deflated nine-time world champion.
Rovanperä had a superb debut at rallying’s top level, scoring fifth overall in his Toyota Yaris WRC. Absorbing everything the Monte had to throw at him, he was there to collect the spoils when those around him dropped the ball. But the teenager admitted he was “sad” not to collect any powerstage points.
Takamoto Katsuta surrendered three minutes when he clouted a snowbank on Saturday morning and rammed the radiator of his Toyota Yaris WRC full with snow. But Katsuta’s mission was to learn the rally and he did just that, winding up seventh but over six minutes behind Loeb.
M-Sport duo Teemu Suninen and Gus Greensmith’s Thursday nights wrecked their rallies as Suninen retired for the day on the second test with a failed transmission and Greensmith’s Fiesta developed a turbo problem.
But while Suninen set about an impressive comeback into the top 10, Greensmith found himself down a bank after making a mess of correcting a slide on an icy corner. He would return on Saturday but failed to break into the top 60 overall and therefore wasn’t able to compete on Sunday due to space constraints in Monaco’s harbour.
Eric Camilli was “very, very, very, very happy” to dominate WRC3 and finish as the top R5 car in his Citroen C3, leading the category from start to finish. The former M-Sport WRC driver was as high as seventh overall after Katsuta’s episode with the countryside but was overhauled by Suninen on the final stage to finish ninth.
Suninen’s powerstage effort was supreme and secured him three additional championship points.
Both Adrien Fourmaux and Ole Christian Veiby flirted with the lead of WRC2 but ultimately it was Mads Ostberg who emerged the victor. M-Sport driver Fourmaux dropped out of contention with two punctures as Ostberg and Veiby each suffered with one.
Veiby kept leader Ostberg honest but in the end Ostberg won comfortably ahead of Fourmaux when Veiby crashed his Hyundai with two stages to go. Ever the entertainer, Citroen’s Ostberg even found time for a donut on the final stage: “To be honest it was a good weekend so I wanted to celebrate,” he said.
American driver Sean Johnston is believed to have made WRC history by becoming the first American driver to take a class win in the series. Johnston and co-driver Alexander Kihurani topped RC4 as the top two-wheel-drive crew home in their Peugeot 208; almost four minutes ahead of second-placed Renaud Dolce.
Final result
1 Neuville (Hyundai)
2 Ogier (Toyota) +12.6s
3 Evans (Toyota) +14.3s
4 Lappi (M-Sport Ford) +3m09.0s
5 Rovanperä (Toyota) +4m17.2s
6 Loeb (Hyundai) +5m04.7s
7 Katsuta (Toyota) +11m27.9s
8 Suninen (M-Sport Ford) +13m30.4s
9 Camilli (Citroën) +13m42.2s
10 Ostberg (Citroën) +14m21.8s
Powerstage scorers
1 Neuville; 2 Ogier +0.016s; 3 Suninen +2.118s; 4 Evans +3.139s; 5 Lappi +6.177s
Rally leaders
SS1: Ogier
SS2-SS3: Neuville
SS4-SS7: Evans
SS8-SS9: Ogier
SS10: Evans
SS11: Evans/Ogier tied
SS12-SS13: Evans
SS14-16: Neuville
Stage wins
Neuville: 9
Evans: 4
Ogier: 3
