Ogier: “One of the stupidest mistakes of my career”

Sébastien Ogier could hope to join in the fight for victory in Rally of Sweden against Jari-Matti Latvala (Toyota) and Ott Tänak (Ford) since he was less than 13 seconds behind his teammate, but the quadruple world champion quickly had to settle for 3rd place after making a mistake in the first meters of the first special of the day (the SS16 of Likenas).

“It was one of the stupidest mistakes of my career, commented the Frenchman. I hit a block of snow on the first turn, 50m after the start, I spun and stalled. I knew from then on that my chances were gone. I didn't even have the chance to try. My weekend was difficult, but it ended well because I scored 19 points and it's a great operation for the Championship. »

Sébastien Ogier is now focusing on the Rally of Mexico held from March 9 to 12, which will be valuable in knowing the level of performance of the new WRC on the main surface type of the calendar.

“I haven't tested the Fiesta WRC on gravel yet, underlined the Gapençais. I knew that I was going to be a little behind the others at the start of the season and that I was going to have difficulty finding the right settings. But the results are still good even though we did not do the best preparation, added the pilot M-Sport. I was happy to see how fast (Latvala) was (in the Power Stage) because he will have to lead the way in Mexico. My deficit of 4 points remains small at this stage of the season. »

Discover the analysis of the Swedish Rally carried out by our special correspondents in issue 2101 of AUTOhebdo, available from Monday evening in digital version on all platforms, and from Wednesday on newsstands.