Tänak saves victory for Toyota in Portugal

Ott Tänak (Toyota) a évité les ennuis dans la dernière étape du Rally from Portugal where the crews still had 5 special stages to tackle. The Estonian signed his third victory of the season, his second in a row after Chile, by winning 3 seconds ahead of Thierry Neuville (Hyundai). Sébastien Ogier (Citroën) completed the podium.

Ott Tänak’s two rivals took advantage of the retirement of Kris Meeke (Toyota). The Northern Irishman, in contention for victory at the start of the day, made a mistake on the penultimate course before having to retire in the Power Stage after hitting a tree stump.

Last minute changes in the O/A @krismeeke forced to retire.

: Last stage of @rallyportugal, the Wolf Power Stage is now live on https://t.co/twccZ0hRvh!⁣ @wolflubes_official pic.twitter.com/7el4tdfm0k

- World Rally Championship (@OfficialWRC) 2th June 2019

Teemu Suninen et Elfyn Evans ont complété le Top 5. Les pilotes M-Sport ont bénéficié de l’abandon d’Esapekka Lappi (Citroën) qui occupait la 5e place avant de partir en tonneau dans l’ES16 et casser sa suspension sur le parcours suivant.

Kalle Rovanperä (Skoda) took the victory in WRC 2 Pro by taking 6th place ahead of Jan Kopecky (Skoda). Pierre-Louis Loubet (Skoda) took victory in WRC 2 ahead of Emil Bergkvist (Ford) who completes the Top 10 in the general classification.

Sébastien Ogier took victory in the Power Stage ahead of Thierry Neuville, Ott Tänak, Teemu Suninen and Dani Sordo (Hyundai). The Estonian deliberately braked at the finish in order to leave the lead of the championship to the Citroën driver so that he could open in the first stage of the Sardinia Rally contested on the weekend of June 16!

Sébastien Ogier is 2 points ahead of Ott Tänak while Thierry Neuville is 10 points behind the Frenchman. Hyundai maintains the lead in the Manufacturers' championship with a 20-point lead over Toyota. Citroën is at 44 units.

Discover the analysis of the Rally of Portugal carried out by our special correspondent in issue 2219 of AUTOhebdo, available from Monday evening in digital version on all platforms, and from this Wednesday on newsstands.