A dramatic WRC Rally Croatia kept the biggest shock for the Wolf Power Stage, when Thierry Neuville crashed out of the lead he had nurtured since stage 14 on Saturday.
The Belgian had been cruising through the Sunday stages but was caught out on a patch of gravel which saw his Hyundai spear towards an escape road, hitting a concrete block on the way, which destroyed his car’s right front suspension.
“I can only say sorry to everyone involved. That’s the only thing I can say. All the rest we will see later. I have no explanation at the moment. This cannot happen. We will see what exactly went wrong.
“I got understeer and immediately opened the wheel and was afraid to slide and we touched something with the wheel and more damage occurred after,” said the devastated Neuville.
Takamoto Katsuta and Aaron Johnston started the stage 75 seconds behind Neuville yet emerged 14.5km later as the winners for the second rally in succession.
Sami Pajari and Marko Salminen moved into second place giving Toyota Gazoo Racing another one-two and their fourth straight win of the season. Hayden Paddon and John Kennard salvaged the final step of the podium for Hyundai, with the next seven places filled by Rally2 machinery.
Super Sunday honours, and the bonus points went to Oliver Solberg who won the Wolf Power stage as well, rescuing ten points from his otherwise unfortunate weekend. In a show of what could have been, Solberg won half of the rally’s stages…
Elfyn Evans ended second in the Super Sunday ranking with Jon Armstrong earning his first WRC points with third place.
Adrien Fourmaux ended fourth after a last stage puncture ended his charge to displace the Ford youngster while Pajari took the final bonus point.
Yohan Rossel ended fourth overall, giving Lancia their first WRC win since San Remo in 1993, albeit in Rally2.
Leo Rossel brought his Citroen home second in WRC and fifth overall, while Nikolay Gryazin rounded out the WRC2 podium, giving Stellantis a clean sweep on the category podium.
Alejandro Cachon was the top WRC2 Toyota in seventh overall, followed by Roope Korhonen, Roberto Dapra and Emil Lindholm.
Read Motorsport Monday tomorrow for the full WRC Rally Croatia report.
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