Ott Tänak has further extended his Rally Estonia lead over Hyundai team-mate Craig Breen as he took his third stage win of the weekend.
The 10.5-mile Kanepi test was a happy hunting ground for Tänak on Saturday morning as he leaped from fourth to first on the stage.
And it seems the World Rally Champion has an affinity for the test, as he went 3.3 seconds faster than second-quickest Kalle Rovanperä to extend his rally lead over Breen to almost 15 seconds.
Breen was fourth quickest in his Hyundai, losing 4.3s to his team-mate and now sits 14.6s behind Tänak overall. He did however nick 0.7s out of Sébastien Ogier to maintain a small but steady gap of 5.3s to the best-placed Toyota in third.
There were no heroics though for Toyota’s leading drivers, as neither Ogier nor Elfyn Evans kept pace with their rookie team-mate Rovanperä on the stage.
Evans’ 0.5s time loss to Rovanperä was more significant however as it drew the 19-year-old just a tiny bit closer – now exactly four seconds behind in fifth place.
Takamoto Katsuta’s quietly sublime rally continued, as he set a time that was just 2.9s slower than the quickest Toyota of Rovanperä and just 1.2s shy of Ogier.
Beating Lappi by 8.2s further consolidated Katsuta’s sixth spot, pulling him 25.5s ahead of the M-Sport Ford overall to round out a Toyota 3-4-5-6.
Teemu Suninen and Pierre-Louis Loubet set an identical stage time on Kanepi, shading Lappi by 0.7s. That did little to affect their overall positions though, with Lappi still seventh ahead of Suninen and Loubet.
Gus Greensmith stalled his Fiesta WRC at a hairpin early on the stage, contributing to his 9.6s deficit to Loubet. He’s now 24.7s behind but confirmed in 10th with Neuville not starting the stage after damaging the rear of his Hyundai.
SS8 times
1 Tänak (Hyundai) 8m10.6s
2 Rovanpera (Toyota) +3.3s
3 Evans (Toyota) +3.8s
4 Breen (Hyundai) +4.3s
4 Ogier (Toyota) +5.0s
6 Katsuta (Toyota) +6.2s
7 Loubet (Hyundai) +14.4s
= Suninen (M-Sport) +14.4s
9 Lappi (M-Sport) +15.1s
10 Greensmith (M-Sport) +24.0s
Leading positions after SS8
1 Tänak (Hyundai) 56m23.3s
2 Breen (Hyundai) +14.6s
3 Ogier (Toyota) +19.9s
4 Evans (Toyota) +33.1s
5 Rovanperä (Toyota) +37.6s
6 Katsuta (Toyota) +50s
7 Lappi (M-Sport) +1m15.5s
8 Suninen (M-Sport) +1m26.3s
9 Loubet (Hyundai) +1m15.1s
10 Greensmith (M-Sport) +2m15.8s
