The Saturday morning of the Croatia Rally has ended and everything remains open in the fourth round of the World Rally Championship (WRC). Thierry Neuville returned to the lead, but the top three are separated by just 11.3s.
The second day started with a surprise in SS 9 (Smerovišće-Grdanjci 1), as the fastest was Adrien Fourmaux (M-Sport Ford) ahead of Neuville (Hyundai). Sébastien Ogier (Toyota) was third, Ott Tänak (Hyundai) fourth, and Elfyn Evans (Toyota) fifth – he who finished yesterday tied with Neuville in the lead.
This was followed by the first pass through the stage of Stojdraga-Gornja Vas, with 20.77km very close: the top four were separated by just 0.4s, with Ogier first with a 0.3s lead over Neuville and Evans. In SS 11 (Vinski Vrh-Duga Resa 1), Neuville was 0.9s faster than Evans to solidify the lead.
The first part of the day ended in the stage of Pećurkovo Brdo-Mrežnički Novaki, with Neuville setting the pace beating Ogier by 2.9s. Tänak and Evans were three seconds behind and Fourmaux was fifth. After this 12th special stage, Neuville leads by 4.7s ahead of Evans. Ogier is third 11.3s behind. The top five is completed by Tänak at 52.2s and Fourmaux, who already has over a minute difference from the leader.
Yohan Rossel (Citroën) won the first three stages on Saturday in WRC2, but Nikolay Gryazin (Citroën) was stronger in SS 12 and remains comfortable at the top – he is 59.9s ahead of the Frenchman. The Bulgarian won the four stages in the WRC2 Challenger standings, where he already leads by 2m21.9s ahead of Pepe López (Skoda).
Also in WRC3 there is a clearly dominant driver – Romet Jürgenson. The Estonian who drives a Ford leads with a 1m56s margin over Taylor Gill (Ford), in a class whose podium is currently closed by Filip Kohn (Ford). Jürgenson only did not achieve a clean sweep of stage wins this morning because Tom Rensonnet (Ford) was faster in SS 10.
