Kalle Rovanperä and Jonne Halttunen ended the first full day of WRC Secto Rally Finland with a 4.9 second lead over Thierry Neuville and Martijn Wydaeghe. Those are the bare facts but do not tell the spectacular story.
In a rally where stages are won by tenths of a second, or even tied in a dead heat, 4.9 seconds is considered a decent lead, as the double world champion fights for his first ever victory on his home event.
After winning the opening superspecial stage on Thursday evening around the streets of Jyväskylä. Ott Tanak and Martin Jarveoja slithered down the order on Friday as they opened the road in the Hyundai i20 N.
Sami Pajari and Marko Salminen won the opening stage from Takamoto Katsuta and Aaron Johnston by 0.1 seconds with Rovanperä a further 0.3 behind.
The Japanese and Finn drivers shared the early overall leaderboard before Rovanperä went on the rampage, setting spectacular stage times as he won stages three and four and took the rally lead which he stretched out over the course of the day as he added stage seven to his tally, but it was still super close with the top four separated by eight seconds.
The fight for second was breathtaking; 3.2 seconds covered Neuville in second, Adrien Fourmaux and Alex Coria in third and Katsuta.
The defending world champion won stage nine and finished three stages with a top three time as he came on song in the afternoon loop, which saw rain turn the stages into damp and muddy roads.
Fourmaux won stage eight, which he tied with Rovanperä, and stage ten to cement his provisional podium place which he took off Katsuta after stage nine.
Katsuta had his strongest morning since the Safari Rally with two second fastest times and held second position overall but after the midday service, his driving became more flawed on the wet stages and slid down to fourth, despite winning stage six.
Pajari took stage five but in the first wet stage after lunch, he was overcautious and with the eighth fastest time on the board, he dropped to fifth overall.
Sebastian Ogier and Vincent Landais, winners in Finland last year, were strangely off the pace in their Toyota GR Yaris and found themselves in sixth overnight with a mountain to climb over the remaining stages. Elfyn Evans and Scott Martin were also off the leading pace, running second on the road all day.
Martins Sesks and Renārs Francis were the leading M-Sport Ford runners as expected in eighth with Josh McErlean and Eoin Treacy holding ninth ahead of the 2019 champions Tanak and Jarveoja.
The Estonian, who took the championship lead after Rally Estonia two weeks ago, suffered from running first on the road and his situation worsened when he did a bit of logging in the forest after understeering into a tree in stage seven. The damage appeared to be cosmetic, and he completed stage eight with a flapping bonnet and a second-hand sounding engine, but the Hyundai made it back to service.
Gregoire Munster and Louis Louka were disappointing in their Puma. Munster had a huge slide in a fast right hander and dropped 22 seconds in stage two and had a full spin in stage four after out braking himself and ended up at the bottom of the Rally1 runners.
Roope Korhonen leads WRC2 from Robert Virves with Georg Linnamäe holding third from Toyota team boss Jari-Matti Latvala.
Oliver Solberg went from hero to zero after rolling out of the rally in stage seven; the car understeered at speed into a ditch which pitched car over. And out.
My oily skin used to lead to constant breakouts.
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