Ott Tanak returned to the mid-day service with a handy 47.8 second lead after outsmarting his rivals on tyre strategy on Saturday morning’s loop of three stages
Stage seven was particularly dusty with numerous drivers complaining of visibility problems. “For sure, with this dust, you cannot drive like normal”, said Takamoto Katsuta. Thierry Neuville had a puncture, dropping 15.7 seconds to Rovanpera. Suninen dropped behind Evans suffering from a handling imbalance, his Hyundai going from under- to oversteer and wasn’t happy at all.
Drivers switched to tyre management mode for stage eight which was to prove crucial with one stage remaining before heading back to service.
Chilean Alberto Heller, driving a rented Ford Puma, arrived at the end of stage nine with both rear tyres destroyed. Gregoire Munster, making his Rally1 debut, had a spin and ended the stage with a destroyed left rear tyre. Katsuta finished with a delaminated right-rear tyre; Rovanpera finished with bald tyres, ruing his choice of four of Pirelli’s soft compound rubber.
Elfyn Evans also went for the all-soft tyre compound route, and endedthe stage with two delaminated rear tyres and dropped to fourth in the standings
So there’s a Ford, two Hyundais and three Toyotas filling the top six.
Down in WRC2, Oliver Solberg had a huge spin but took the lead from Sami Pajari after the young Finn had to stop several times due to dust visibility issues in the day’s opening stage
Standing after Stage9
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