Hyundai driver Thierry Neuville threw away a healthy lead at Rally Sweden after damaging his steering during the final SuperSpecial of Saturday’s running, in the process sparking a three-way battle for the win.
Neuville had built up a comfortable 43.3s advantage over Toyota’s Jari-Matti Latvala after the bulk of the competitive stages, adding 15-seconds to his lead in the process.
But then Neuville hit a concrete block on the edge of the road and damaged his steering during the final 1.9km stage of the day, immediately parking his Hyundai, which left the scene on the back of a tow truck.
It marks the second straight rally in which a mistake on Saturday’s final stage has denied Neuville a clear shot at victory, after his Rallye Monte Carlo error, though he still has a chance of points on the power stage via Rally2.
Neuville’s exit from the lead now means an increasingly competitive battle for second has now been turned into a scrap for overall honours.
M-Sport’s Ott Tänak won four straight stages to close the deficit to Latvala and ended the day just 3.8s behind his rival, in what is now a fight for victory, while championship leader and Monte winner Sébastien Ogier remains in contention, just 16.6s behind Latvala.
Kris Meeke had been trailing Ogier by a few seconds but lost control of his Citroën on SS14 and dropped out of the top 10, though was able to complete the stage with the assistance of spectators.
Meeke’s demise elevated Dani Sordo into fourth place, now the leading Hyundai driver, with Craig Breen in fifth, in front of Elvyn Evans and Hayden Paddon, who lost time after a power steering failure.
Stéphane Lefebvre, competeing in the earlier Citroën DS3 WRC, holds eighth, with WRC2 drivers Pontus Tidemand (Skoda Fabuia R5) and Teemu Suninen (Ford Fiesta R5 Evo2) completing the top 10.
Meeke now lies 12th while Neuville starts the Sunday stages in 13th, albeit 1m16s and 1m22s respectively away from a spot in the top ten points paying positions.
