Oliver Solberg managed to keep hold of the Safari Rally Kenya lead by a second from a charging Toyota World Rally Championship team-mate Sebastien Ogier after an eventful Friday.
Monte Carlo winner Solberg started the day with a 33.3s advantage over Elfyn Evans and more than a minute margin over Ogier, but Kenya’s brutal stages resulted in his lead being almost wiped out.
The battle for the lead was ignited when Solberg picked up a right-rear puncture in stage eight, the second pass through the rocky Geothermal (13.16km) stage. The Toyota driver was forced to back off and lost 32.6s.
It left Solberg with a one-second lead ahead of Ogier, who had starred throughout the day to claw back much of the time he lost when a heavy rain shower struck on Thursday. Ogier also picked up a puncture in stage six but it didn’t cost the reigning world champion too much time having ended the morning loop 38.2 adrift of Solberg.
Ogier kicked off the afternoon with a fastest time in stage seven to move ahead of Evans into second position. After Solberg’s puncture, Ogier managed to cut the gap to the rally lead to 0.7s to heap pressure on Solberg. However, Solberg, who had adopted a strategy of trying to be clean and careful, responded to put 0.3s into his lead on the day’s final stage.
“We are back to zero now with Seb,” said Solberg and when asked about the battle with Ogier, he added: “I have had a fight with him before and this year, I’m leading 1-0, so let’s see. He has had an incredible day, really, really impressive. I have tried to be smart and do my thing and clearly we were too careful and we had bad luck with the puncture. We will go again tomorrow.”
Sebastien Ogier, Vincent Landais, Toyota Gazoo Racing WRT Toyota GR Yaris Rally1
Photo by: Toyota Racing
Ogier was proud of his efforts considering the deficit he faced at the start of Friday, and believes he is in the better position ahead of Saturday, regarded as the toughest day of the rally.
“It has been a good day. It is actually better to not be in the lead tonight because we know it always starts raining in the afternoon and most of the time the rear guys suffer the most,” he said. “Tomorrow is a big day and it will be a massive challenge to survive that one.”
Evans managed to survive the day with his biggest issue being a bent wheel, but the Welshman slipped to third, 20.5s from the lead.
“I think getting through without issue was quite important. Obviously tomorrow all hell is going to break loose [with the stages and the weather],” Evans said. “We are in an OK position for now but obviously there is a long way to go. If past years are to go by a bit of everything [can happen tomorrow]. You can never be ready for that.”
Toyota’s Sami Pajari produced arguably the drive of the day claiming four stage wins to climb to fourth overall, 1m10.5s behind the lead. The Finn managed to leapfrog fourth-placed team-mate Takamoto Katsuta when the Japanese suffered a double front puncture in stage seven.
After using his two spare wheels, Katsuta was forced to back off to protect his four remaining tyres and ultimately dropped to seventh overall, behind Hyundai duo Thierry Neuville [+1m46.1s] and Adrien Fourmaux [+1m47.3s].
Thierry Neuville, Martijn Wydaeghe, Hyundai World Rally Team Hyundai i20 N Rally1
Photo by: Hyundai
The Hyundais showed more pace on Friday but are yet to claim a stage win. They did largely avoid the overheating issues that plagued the team on Thursday night. Neuville was however forced to fix a radiator issue caused by a stone which resulted in the Belgian nursing his car to the end of day service. Fourmaux again showed flashes of speed to sit 1.2s behind Neuville in sixth.
Esapekka Lappi struggled for speed in the third Hyundai, reporting a locking issue with his differential. The Finn also lost time when he backed off to allow a family of giraffe to cross stage nine, before another wild moment later in the stage.
“We had a family of giraffe [on the road] and the baby one was the last one so I dropped to first gear and followed it for 200-300 metres so I lost maybe 15-20 seconds. We lost time but I didn’t want to risk anything because of the animal. At the end I just washed out and touched a tree and luckily it was a soft touch,” said Lappi.
It proved to be a difficult day for M-Sport-Ford as Josh McErlean was forced to retire due to a leaking gearbox caused by an impact that also inflicted a puncture in stage seven. Team-mate Jon Armstrong also hit trouble in stage nine which required a lengthy stage-side repair. The Northern Irishman ended the day with only two-wheel drive from his Ford Puma.
In WRC2, Robert Virves moved into the lead of the class, sitting in ninth overall, 14.5s ahead of Gus Greensmith.
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