Ott Tänak will take a strong 43.9-second lead into the final day of Acropolis Rally Greece.
The Hyundai driver has finished second on each of the past two World Rally Championship events, but has led the Acropolis since Friday afternoon.
Five stage wins from six across the second full day signified Tänak’s intent, who also made a better tire choice than his team-mates – avoiding the softs that they took, believing rain would arrive.
“Obviously it’s been great – nothing else we can say,” Tänak commented. “Since the morning, the road position and also the car improved since yesterday.”
Sébastien Ogier is a comfortable second, moving ahead of Adrien Fourmaux when the Frenchman hit a rock and lost a minute with damaged suspension on the final stage of the morning.
The eight-time world champion hasn’t gone all-out to chase Tänak down – well aware that speed may not be the deciding factor.
Both Fourmaux (third) and Elfyn Evans (fourth) are comfortable in their positions, on what was a positive day for the latter’s world championship aspirations with the mechanical retirement of his team-mate Kalle Rovanperä on SS11.
Takamoto Katsuta also bowed out of the contest on the same stage when he marginally outbraked himself on a downhill approach to a left-hander.
Those incidents released Thierry Neuville into fifth, albeit well over a minute down on Evans.
Saturday was not an easy day for either of M-Sport’s two full-time drivers, as Grégoire Munster was without his handbrake for the entire day and Josh McErlean the same for the afternoon.
McErlean also had to change components of his rear suspension in the morning after contact with a bank on the day’s first stage.
Mãrtiņš Sesks had a quiet day opening the road but completed all of the stages without drama, while Sami Pajari failed to start with Toyota preferring to keep investigating the fuel system issue that sidelined him on Friday.
M-Sport privateer Jourdan Serderidis retired after two stages as he was feeling unwell.
In WRC2, Oliver Solberg remains the class of the field with a 1m37.8s advantage over Gus Greensmith. Greensmith’s Škoda is in a Toyota sandwich, with Kajetan Kajetanowicz exactly 10.0s behind in third.
Yohan Rossel fancies taking both Greensmith and Kajetanowicz tomorrow though – ending Saturday 15.1s adrift of the podium but stating his target is second.
