Neuville suffers power issue as Evans claims the lead

Thierry Neuville’s World Rally Championship title hopes took a knock after suffering a power issue while Toyota’s Elfyn Evans moved into the Rally Japan lead.

Championship leader Neuville won the day’s opening test and was sitting in second before a sudden loss of power hampered the Belgian, who only needs to score six points this weekend to secure a maiden world title.

Evans shot from third to the rally lead on stage three taking a 0.7s lead over Neuville’s title rival Ott Tanak heading into the midday tyre fitting zone, with Neuville sitting third, 40.2s adrift.

Toyota’s Takamoto Katsuta climbed to fourth [+1m11.2s] after suffering a stage-two puncture. 

Overnight leader Adrien Fourmaux held fifth [+1m13.5s] ahead of Hyundai’s Andreas Mikkelsen [+1m19.8s] while Gregoire Munster [+1m32.4s], Nikolay Gryazin [1m44.3s], Sebastien Ogier [+2m03.4s] and Sami Pajari [+2m31.0s] rounded out the top 10.

Friday’s opening stage proved to be a disaster for Toyota as the brand’s bid to overhaul the 15-point deficit to Hyundai in the manufacturers’ title battle took a significant hit. 

Ogier and Katsuta suffered punctures in stage two, Isegami’s Tunnel (23.67km), which had been earmarked as potentially the toughest of the rally. The technical stage was dry with damp patches and a covering of leaves that made conditions particularly slippery and unpredictable.

Ogier stopped 11.7km into the test to change a front-left wheel, costing him 2m05.9s which dropped him well down the order.

“No idea [how it happened], The first few corners were very slippy and I was understeering,” said Ogier.

Katsuta was also oblivious as to why he suffered a puncture. The Japanese driver did manage to haul his GR Yaris to the stage end with a rear-left tyre off the rim, ceding 1m03s. 

That meant Evans was the only Toyota driver to enjoy a clean run as he set the third fastest time on the stage to move into third overall.

But there was no stopping the Hyundais of championship leader Neuville and title rival Tanak as Toyota’s drama lifted the pressure on the pair.

Neuville, first on the road, set the pace to win the stage by 1.2s from Tanak, but it was the latter that surged into the rally lead by half a second from his team-mate.

“There was less leaves than expected but I tried to have a clean run,” said…