Evans isolates himself at the head of Rally Finland

It was expected, the second stage of Rally of Finland was to provoke the selection among the competitors of the World Rally Championship (WRC). This was the case, and experienced pilots and young talents alike were trapped.

At Toyota, we lost Takamoto Katsuta then, and more surprisingly, the national star Kalle Rovanperä on Saturday morning. The fault lies in small driving errors which pay off in cash in one of the fastest rounds on the calendar.

The third man who returns to the Jyväskylä service park with his head down (and on foot) is Thierry Neuville (Hyundai). The Belgian suffered a mechanical breakdown in the penultimate SS of the day, possibly linked to a poor landing of a jump.

In the South Korean clan, Andrea Adamo makes a grimace. The Italian team manager stood up with a Craig Breen in sparkling form this Saturday morning; he is going to dine with the Irishman behind in the third row and a Ott Tänak who fails to catch up with leader Elfyn Evans (Toyota). The Estonian, however, set three scratch times in a row in the second loop before lowering his pace.

The Welshman Elfyn Evans is therefore the strong man before the final stage. The outgoing world vice-champion made no mistakes and did not panic when his rival Ott Tänak went on the offensive.

With only four special stages remaining on Sunday morning, the 32-year-old driver can hope to add the legendary Scandinavian rally to his list of achievements for the first time in his career. “I had a lot of fun today, the battle with Ott was great. There is still a long way to go, we will take the stages one after the other. »

At the foot of the provisional podium, we find the returning Esapekka Lappi (Toyota). The Finn, who is competing in his first WRC rally of the year, cannot aim for the podium on a regular basis, but has built a nice margin over his pursuer. Sébastien Ogier (Toyota).

The Frenchman was never transcendent, but took advantage of the troubles of Rovanperä and Katsuta to gain two positions. “The second loop went much better. Our change of set-up was really good for my confidence and our pace was pretty good. If we take into account the running order, it wasn't too bad this afternoon. The last objective is the Power Stage. »

Behind the Gapençais, Gus Greensmith (Ford) does not have to worry about his teammate Adrien fourmaux (Ford). The Frenchman must discover Rally1 in Finland as well as work alongside his new co-driver Alexandre Coria. “I am very happy with this day. I learned a lot on this stage, including how to sweep the road because I was leading the way. »

In WRC2, Teemu Suninen (Volkswagen) considers himself “lucky”, and for good reason: his race could have ended on the liaison course. “We had an alert about the temperature of the radiator. So we continued without a bumper as a precaution to cool the front of the car. » The former representative M-Sport Ford has constantly built its lead over Mads Ostberg (Citroën). Oliver Solberg (Hyundai) retired after a roll at the start of the stage.

General classification :