Rally of Catalonia – Sébastien Ogier at ease, M-Sport Ford struggling

The Saturday morning loop at Rally of Catalonia 2022 promised to be perilous, with the two longest special stages to be covered in this penultimate round of the World Rally Championship (WRC). This did not fail, with an accident leading to the cancellation of SS11, El Montmell (24,18 km).

The person responsible for this interruption is Gus Greensmith (M-Sport Ford). The English driver, visibly motivated by a mysterious battle for ninth place against his teammate Adrien fourmaux, braked too late before a bend and seriously damaged his Ford Puma hybrid against the guardrail. This is the second time in a row that Gus Greensmith has made a mistake in the second stage of a rally after New Zealand.

Before this crash, all eyes were focused on the battle for first position. Although he strives to tell the media on site that his mount does not give him as much confidence as the previous year with the thermal i20, Thierry Neuville (Hyundai) a impressionné les observateurs via un meilleur temps dans la première ES du jour.

The Belgian was then relegated to a supporting role by Sébastien Ogier (Toyota). Le Français, qui avait fait le jeu de son équipier Kalle Rovanperä afin de lui permettre de devenir champion du monde en Nouvelle-Zélande voilà deux semaines, a reçu carte blanche de la part de son patron et ex-équipier Jari-Matti Latvala. Cette fois, le Gapençais est libre de se battre pour la victoire, et il savoure cette opportunité.

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The eight-time WRC champion took the lead in SS10, and increased his lead at the top of the event. He has almost 10 seconds of margin over Kalle Rovanperä who did not seem to have the knife between his teeth in this first loop of Saturday, contested on dry tarmac. Thierry Neuville flirts with 30 seconds of disbursement.

Behind, Ott Tänak (Hyundai) is reduced to waiting for a problem within the trio to get on the virtual podium. His teammate, veteran Dani Sordo, “is not looking for any excuses” and admits not being at the expected level (5th over a minute behind). The local stage is even under pressure from the return of Elfyn Evans (Toyota).

Sans Gus Greensmith, le clan M-Sport reste dans un second rideau. Craig Breen is seventh, while Adrien Fourmaux tries in vain to catch up with Nippon Takamoto Katsuta (Toyota). Pierre-Louis Loubet enters the top 10 due to the accident of his British colleague.

In WRC2, the battle between Teemu Suninen (Hyundai) and Nikolay Gryazin (Skoda) takes place at a distance, because the Finn is resting on a 25” lead. Frenchman Yohan Rossel (Citroën) nevertheless trails Nikolay Gryazin by only 4 tenths.

The Rally de Catalunya will resume at 14:14 p.m.

General classification after SS11: