Kalle Rovanperä has overhauled Toyota team-mate Elfyn Evans to lead the Toyota charge and put pressure on the podium places on Friday’s penultimate Ypres Rally stage, while Thierry Neuville increased his lead.
Evans was the fastest Toyota driver on all four of Friday morning’s stages, but on the repeat passes he’s struggled to maintain the same performance.
Both Rovanperä and Sébastien Ogier have been quicker across the second loop, and Evans’ downturn in pace cost him a position on SS7 as he slid behind Rovanperä into fifth overall, 0.8s adrift.
“It feels better this afternoon, but obviously the times aren’t coming so we need to look at that,” Evans said.
Rovanperä meanwhile has got himself within 1.4s of Tänak’s third position as the Hyundai driver struggles with an engine issue.
Photo: Hyundai Motorsport
“I’m generally down on boost, lacking general power,” reiterated Tänak.
Out front, Neuville has further extended his rally lead over Hyundai stablemate Craig Breen, outpacing Breen by 3.6s on Kemmelberg 2 to head him by 7.6s overall.
SS7 was in fact the first time the two drivers – who are the only pair in the World Rally Car pack to have competed in Ypres before – didn’t lock out the top two stage positions. Ogier’s Toyota was second fastest, 1.8s down on Neuville.
“I thought I had a good stage honestly speaking,” rued Breen. “I’m trying the best that I’ve got now, and I guess compared to the others it isn’t terrible.”
Neuville added: “Not a clean run to be honest, I just tried to follow the road and stay in the clean lines.
“There are no surprises for me so far, hopefully it stays like this.”
Takamoto Katsuta and Pierre-Louis Loubet both made it safely through to consolidate their respective seventh and eighth positions overall.
The WRC2 leaderboard turned on its head on SS7 as class leader Teemu Suninen picked up a front-left puncture and then halted when his engine cut out; the front grille of his Fiesta Rally2 completely filled with grass.
Jari Huttunen should have been the driver to benefit, but he too collected a puncture meaning his Hyundai team-mate Oliver Solberg vaulted from third to first, leading Huttunen by a massive 2m48.7s.
“I am? OK!” said Solberg upon learning he now led the category.
“I pushed like hell in there, it’s my best stage on Tarmac, ever. Not too bad.”
The dramatic leaderboard twist means that on its debut, the i20 N Rally2 is now on course to score a one-two.
By contrast, M-Sport – which has already lost both of its World Rally Cars – lost both its Rally2 machines on SS7 too as Tom Kristensson stopped just after the first split after clipping the inside of a corner and breaking his suspension.
SS7 times
1 Thierry Neuville/Martijn Wydaeghe (Hyundai) 11m28.8s
2 Sébastien Ogier/Julien Ingrassia (Toyota) +1.8s
3 Kalle Rovanperä/Jonne Halttunen (Toyota) +3.2s
4 Elfyn Evans/Scott Martin (Toyota) +5.9s
5 Ott Tänak/Martin Järveoja (Hyundai) +7.2s
2 Craig Breen/Paul Nagle (Hyundai) +1.5s
Leading positions after SS7
1 Neuville/Wydaeghe 1h04m27.0s
2 Breen/Nagle +7.6s
3 Tänak/Järveoja +31.2s
4 Rovanperä/Halttunen +32.6s
5 Evans/Martin +33.4s
6 Ogier/Ingrassia +39.4s
7 Takamoto Katsuta/Keaton Williams (Toyota) +1m24.5s
8 Pierre-Louis Loubet/Florian Haut-Labourdette (2C Competition Hyundai) +2m50.0s
9 Yohan Rossel/Alexandre Coria (Citroën) +5m28.2s
10 Oliver Solberg/Aaron Johnston (Hyundai) +5m44.9s
