Toyota is dominating Super Sunday of Rally Chile with a top three lockout, with Kalle Rovanperä one stage away from the rally win.
Following a foggy end to Saturday’s action, the extreme weather continued on Sunday morning with overnight rain creating muddy stages with restricted visibility.
First on the road was therefore not the handicap it usually is on gravel, and Sébastien Ogier made full use of that by winning the day’s opening stage by an impressive 5.6 seconds.
Rovanperä and Elfyn Evans made it a Toyota 1-2-3 with the second and third fastest times, while Esapekka Lappi led the Hyundai trio over Ott Tänak and Thierry Neuville.
Tänak disrupted Toyota’s formation on he much shorter Bio Bio stage, which will be repeated later as the powerstage, as he steered his Hyundai to the third-best time, but Ogier – who was quickest again – strengthened his Sunday lead ahead of Rovanperä and Evans, with Tänak replacing Hyundai stablemate Lappi in fourth.
Ogier felt as if his road position advantage was neutered on the second pass, as he was left with what he called a “s*** line” from the first pass which made his job complicated on SS15.
But the eight-time champion was still quickest to establish an 8.1s Super Sunday lead over Rovanperä, with Evans 12.5s in arrears.
Hyundai’s leading contender, Tänak, is 15.9s shy of Ogier.
Lappi ripped the front bumper off his Hyundai for the second time this weekend on SS15, which allowed Neuville to move ahead of him to fifth in Sunday’s standings.
“There was ruts here and there and yeah in one entry I was too aggressive, a rut pulled me in and there was a gravel bank,” Lappi explained. “Immediately the bumper was gone.”
Adrien Fourmaux is on-track for one Super Sunday point, but spun at the same corner as Lappi lost his bumper and lost 15s having to reverse twice.
Mārtiņš Sesks is not in contention for Super Sunday points as he continues to build his experience but survived a lairy moment at the end of SS15 when the rear wing of his Ford Puma Rally1 parted company right on the finish-line.
So much so that Sesks didn’t even realize he had lost it.
“What!? I didn’t even know what happened,” a puzzled Sesks said at stage-end.
“Really? Actually I had no idea. Wow, alright.”
