The Friday afternoon loop of Rally México has been shortened with SS8 Ortega 2 canceled as a result of the fire that affected Esapekka Lappi’s Ford Fiesta WRC.
M-Sport driver Lappi came to the end of El Chocolate 2 with a fire at the rear of his car but the blaze could not be contained.
The car has burned out to a shell, with emergency services attending the car that was parked several hundred meters down the road.
As the emergency vehicles had to attend to Lappi’s burning Fiesta, there was not enough time nor resource in place to reposition them in time for the schedule to be maintained, which ultimately resulted in the loss of the two stages.
The cancelation of the second Ortega stage means that Las Minas 2, the two passes of the Autódromo Shell V-Power and the León street stage remain on Friday’s itinerary.
WRC points leader Elfyn Evans is currently due to start Las Minas at 6.15pm local time.
Toyota’s Sébastien Ogier leads the rally, 8.2 seconds ahead of Teemu Suninen with Thierry Neuville in third.
