Ott Tänak has lost third place to Sébastien Ogier after a dramatic rain-affected final stage on Saturday, but Thierry Neuville leads Safari Rally Kenya for the second night in succession.
Saturday’s final stage, the repeat pass of Sleeping Warrior, was held under the cover of threatening, dark clouds which eventually dispatched pockets of very heavy rain throughout phases of the stage, and wreaked havoc.
The first runners, the restarting Dani Sordo and Elfyn Evans, Lorenzo Bertelli and and Kalle Rovanperä, were unaffected by the adverse weather but others were not so lucky.
Adrien Fourmaux was the first driver to battle a heavy shower in the middle of the stage – rain battering the windshield of his M-Sport Ford.
Team-mate Gus Greensmith was the first to fall foul, out-braking himself on a left-hander and going straight on into a field as the grip on the road changed dramatically due to the rain.
To compound matters, the entire WRC field was running hard compound Pirelli rubber, the wrong tire for the conditions, and Greensmith described the conditions as “horrific”.
Tänak’s woe began almost immediately as his windshield misted up and he had to crawl his Hyundai through the early sections of the stage. Eventually his patience wore thin, and he and co-driver Martin Järveoja stopped to clear the foggy windshield.
The 2019 world champions were stationary for around one minute and eventually they lost 1m42.2s to Ogier – who described it as “like driving on ice”.
But it ended up being an incredibly strong test for the world championship leader who is now up to third, 1m05.7s ahead of Tänak and just 18.1s behind second-placed Takamoto Katsuta.
“The screen heater was not working [on] my side, on Martin’s side it was working,” said Tänak.
“It’s amazing, the quality is amazing,” he added sarcasticly.
Photo: Toyota Gazoo Racing
Katsuta, who was only eighth fastest, added: “Very scary. I’ve never been feeling that kind of feeling.
“Completely mud in there, I braked 200m [for a corner] and I was off. Aaaa, ooohh. OK, I’m here.”
Neuville’s rally lead has ballooned to 57.4s as he battled to set the sixth-fastest time. He therefore holds an advantage of 1m15.5s over title rival Ogier but feared it could be much more. In the end, he only lost 10.5s on the stage to the Toyota.
“I took quite some risks to try to keep on because I knew Ogier was 12 minutes in front so he had probably a much drier road than us,” said Neuville.
“I kept pushing to not lose any time, I’m really satisfied we are here.”
Greensmith and Fourmaux are now split by just 12s in fifth and sixth respectively as Fourmaux weathered his brief excursion with the storm to set the third-fastest time.
Photo: M-Sport World Rally Team
A frustrated Tänak is only 18.2s ahead of the lead M-Sport in fourth, 2m21.2s down on the rally lead.
Evans and Sordo end Saturday 10.4s apart, and now in 12th and 13th overall after the weather struck everyone behind them. Sordo was 5.1s faster than Evans on the final test, which ended up being enough for him to win the stage.
Onker Rai is looking favorite to seal the victory in WRC3, holding eighth overall in his Volkswagen Golf GTI R5 with over 2m30s in hand over Fiesta R5 driver Karan Patel.
Rai has led WRC3 ever since the first proper stage on Friday, but received a 10s penalty on Saturday due to a late check-in to a time control. Five-time Safari winner Carl Tundo rounds out the class podium and the overall top 10.
SS13 times
1 Dani Sordo/Borjza Rozada (Hyundai) 17m25.0s
2 Elfyn Evans/Scott Martin (Toyota) +5.1s
3 Adrien Fourmaux/Renaud Jamoul (M-Sport Ford) +6.0s
4 Kalle Rovanperä/Jonne Halttunen (Toyota) +17.0s
5 Sébastien Ogier/Julien Ingrassia (Toyota) +24.6s
6 Thierry Neuville/Martijn Wydaeghe (Hyundai) +35.1s
Leading positions after SS13
1 Neuville/Wydaeghe 2h45m04.6s
2 Takamoto Katsuta/Daniel Barritt (Toyota) +57.4s
3 Ogier/Ingrassia +1m15.5s
4 Ott Tänak/Martin Järveoja (Hyundai) +2m21.2s
5 Gus Greensmith/Chris Patterson (M-Sport Ford) +2m39.4s
6 Fourmaux/Jamoul +2m51.4s
7 Rovanperä/Halttunen +11m04.3s
8 Onkar Rai/Drew Sturrock (Volkswagen) +25m59.1s
9 Karan Patel/Tauseef Khan (Ford) +31m31.8s
10 Carl Tundo/Timothy Jessop (Volkswagen) +33m26.0s
