World Rally Championship title favourite Thierry Neuville overhauled Toyota’s Sebastien Ogier to move into the lead at the Central European Rally on Friday morning.
The Hyundai driver, who has the chance to seal a maiden world title this weekend, completed the morning’s three slippery Czech asphalt stages with a 2.7s advantage over overnight leader Ogier.
Hyundai’s Ott Tanak held third [+3.8s] ahead of Toyota’s Elfyn Evans [+6.3s], with Takamoto Katsuta [+19.1s], Sami Pajari [41.6s], Adrien Fourmaux [+47.1s] and Gregoire Munster completing the top eight. Stage five was brought to premature halt when Hyundai’s Andreas Mikkelsen crashed out of sixth position.
The morning began with a second run through the slippery Klatovy stage that was held in darkness on Thursday night.
Once again it was Ogier who set the pace on the 11.78km test this time with the advantage of daylight. The Toyota driver admitted it wasn’t a “perfect run” due to the challenging bumpy road.
The overnight leader’s time was however 2.3s faster than his nearest rival Neuville, who tackled the stage first.
With crews taking in a remote service last night, Neuville could only make a partial repair to his front right wheel arch damaged in Thursday’s opening stage, using tape.
“I struggled a bit with understeer but overall probably the easiest stage of the day,” said Neuville, who dropped 3.2s behind the leader.
Katsuta emerged as the closest challenge to Ogier’s time on the stage thanks to an impressive effort that was 1.5s shy on a road that was becoming increasingly dirty with every pass. The effort moved the Japanese driver to third overall on his return to the WRC after sitting out Rally Chile.
Evans also climbed the leaderboard from seventh to fifth behind Tanak after posting a time 2.2s slower than Ogier.
Rookie team-mate Pajari appeared to be on course for a blistering time having matched Ogier’s early splits before a sudden hybrid failure left him 3.7s adrift.
Mikkelsen dropped from sitting third overnight to seventh despite his clean run while the M-Sport Fords of Fourmaux and Munster struggled for speed, propping up the bottom of the timesheets on the stage.
Sébastien Ogier, Vincent Landais, Toyota Gazoo Racing WRT Toyota GR Yaris Rally1
Photo by: Toyota Racing
Conditions were trickier in stage four (Strasin, 26.69km) which featured damp sections, light drizzle and fog patches.
Evans managed to tame the…
Click Here to Read the Full Original Article at Motorsport.com – RALLY – Stories…