Sebastien Ogier storms to WRC Rally Paraguay lead as punctures disrupt more cars

Sébastien Ogier moved into the Rally Paraguay lead after World Rally Championship title rival Kalle Rovanperä became the latest to suffer a costly puncture.

Eight-time world champion Ogier will head into Sunday’s final four stages 10.3s ahead of Hyundai’s Adrien Fourmaux, with championship leader Elfyn Evans in third [+36.6s], after a dramatic turn of events on Paraguay’s loose gravel stages.

Ogier dropped to as low as eighth on Friday after losing more than half a minute to a puncture. Since that setback, the Frenchman has thrown caution to the wind and rocketed up the leaderboard to fourth at the start of Saturday.

The Toyota driver climbed to third when Hyundai’s Ott Tanak dropped from second to sixth when the latter suffered a left rear puncture in stage 10. Ogier then rattled off fastest times in stage 10 and stage 12 to close to within 0.5s of Fourmaux, who hung on to second at midday service.

Grégoire Munster, Louis Louka, M-Sport Ford World Rally Team Ford Puma Rally1

Photo by: M-Sport

Third quickly became second when Ogier, having gambled on carrying only one spare wheel, continued his stunning pace on Saturday afternoon. Ogier won stage 13 to move ahead of Fourmaux and cut Rovanpera’s rally lead down to 14.4s.

The battle for the victory was then turned on its head when Rovanpera picked up a front right puncture midway through 22.73km pass through Artigas 2. The two-time world champion opted against stopping to change the wheel, and lost a whopping 2m38.0s, dropping from the lead to sixth.

“No idea. We got a puncture from somewhere there was no real big hit so I don’t know,” said Rovanpera, who ended Saturday 2m21.2s adrift of the lead.

Elfyn Evans, Scott Martin, Toyota Gazoo Racing WRT Toyota GR Yaris Rally1

Photo by: Red Bull Content Pool

“Obviously we should have changed the tyre. Jonne [Halttunen co-driver] was saying we should go to the end and I didn’t know how much we had left, and clearly it was a wrong decision this time but that is how it is.”

Now in the lead, Ogier managed to extend his lead over Fourmaux despite admitting that his run through the day’s final stage wasn’t his best.

Evans managed to hold onto third after another difficult day struggling to find the feeling and confidence behind the wheel of his GR Yaris.The Welshman is, however, the only Rally1 driver not to encounter a serious tyre issue to date this weekend.

Evans will head into Sunday with a slender 2.5s margin over Tanak, who battled back from his puncture woes to overtake reigning world champion Thierry Neuville.

Thierry Neuville, Martijn Wydaeghe, Hyundai World Rally Team Hyundai i20 N Rally1

Photo by: Fabien Dufour / Hyundai Motorsport

Neuville continued to cut a frustrated figure after being unable to unlock pace from his Hyundai i20 N. The Belgian did climb to fifth [+46.8s] following Rovanpera’s tyre issue.

Toyota’s Sami Pajari held seventh as the Finn continued to recover from a costly puncture on Friday after running as high as third. 

Grégoire Munster, Louis Louka, M-Sport Ford World Rally Team Ford Puma Rally1

Photo by: M-Sport

M-Sport Ford duo Josh McErlean and Gregoire Munster were forced to retire due to impacts to the sump guard of their Ford Pumas in stage nine. Toyota’s Takamoto Katsuta rejoined the rally after his crash on Friday.

Close battle in Rally2

Robert Virves, Jakko Viilo, Toksport WRT Skoda Fabia Evo Rally2

Photo by: Red Bull Content Pool

The Artigas stage shook up the battle for the victory in WRC2 as a puncture for leader Nikolay Gryazin after hitting an object in the middle of the road forced him to change a wheel.

Robert Virves inherited a 6.5s lead over Oliver Solberg, as his impressive recovery from a Friday puncture continued, with Yohan Rossel in third. However, Solberg felt he should be awarded some time back from rally organisers after getting caught in the dust of the recovering Fabrizio Zaldivar, who had been delayed by an off-road excursion.

“Full dust, full dust I lost five seconds at least because of him [Zaldivar] at the end now. It is all the braking points at the end so I really hope I can get some time back, that was not good,” said Solberg.

Four stages, compromising 79.50 kilometres, await the crews on Sunday.