There is a new leader in the Central Europe Rally. Thierry Neuville is now in front of this penultimate round of the World Rally Championship (WRC), after overtaking Kalle Rovanperä on Saturday morning. The Finnish driver is very close to securing the title in this event, after Elfyn Evans had an incident in the last morning stage. Only the Power Stage can now give the British driver a chance to continue the fight until Japan… and it may not be enough.
Yesterday afternoon, Evans (Toyota), Rovanperä (Toyota), and Neuville (Hyundai) shared the victories, but it was the Finn who ended the day better, with a lead of over half a minute, compared to Neuville – who overtook Evans at the end of the day to take second place.
This Saturday, already in Austria, it started with SS 9 (Schärdinger Innviertel 1), in which Evans was the fastest, 1.3s ahead of Neuville, followed by Rovanperä, 2.1s behind. In the next stage in Mühltal, Neuville set the pace, surpassing Evans by 3.8s. Rovanperä made a mistake in a hairpin and lost a lot of time, reducing his lead to 10.9s.
Right in SS 11 (Knaus Tabbert Bayerischer Wald 1), Neuville repeated the best time, this time 2.3s ahead of teammate Teemu Suninen, with Sébastien Ogier (Toyota) in fourth and Grégoire Munster (M-Sport Ford) in fifth. Evans had an incident that took him out of the fight for the top positions, while Rovanperä – knowing the situation of his only rival in the title fight – chose not to take risks and set the eighth time.
Therefore, Neuville leads the rally 11.1s ahead of the Nordic driver, with Tänak in third, already over a minute behind the top. Ogier and Suninen complete the top five ahead of Takamoto Katsuta (Toyota).
Emil Lindholm (Hyundai) is the leader of WRC2, with a margin since yesterday afternoon between ten and twenty seconds. His main pursuer is Nicolas Ciamin (Skoda), who won two of the morning stages (the other was won by Lindholm), now separated by 16.3s. Erik Cais (Skoda) follows closely behind, 17.6s behind. Ciamin leads the WRC2 Challenger after dominating Saturday morning and reaching the top. He has only a 1.3s margin over Cais, with Nikolay Gryazin (Skoda) third in the class, 25.9s behind. In WRC3, Filip Kohn is the only survivor.
Top ten overall after SS 11:
