Sébastien Ogier leads in Türkiye

It is a new era which is opening in rally. From now on, not a single driver will be sent onto the track to sweep the roads of his teammate, if he is not in his legal place in the starting order of the specials. In addition, the FIA ​​wants no driver to slow down at the end of the day to slip down in the general classification, in order to suffer less from being swept away in the next day's specials. If this is the case, the FIA ​​promises sanctions. From then on, the drivers attack on this first day of the Rally of Turkey, without really knowing where they will have to be at the end of the day, knowing that they will not be able to manage their possible lead by slowing down in the last special.

In the first special of the day, it's Petter Solberg (Citroën C4 WRC) who was the fastest, automatically taking control of the Rally. But he didn't stay in the lead for long since, in SS2, it was Mikko Hirvonen (Ford Focus WRC) who was ahead of everyone, taking over at the top of the general classification.

In SS3, it's a third driver, Sébastien Ogier (Citroën C4 WRC) who set the scratch time, in turn taking control of the Rally. But, in SS4, although Petter Solberg was the fastest, the Citroën Junior Team driver retained the reins of the standings.

A second loop of four stages is planned from 13 p.m. (French time). It is the classification at the end of SS8 which will determine the starting order in Saturday's specials. However, there will still be one special to compete in the evening, the Istanbul super special, "long" of 2,2 km, from 18:57 p.m.