Ogier leader in Croatia, Evans and Neuville remain hopeful

Sébastien Ogier (Toyota) will sleep well tonight. At the end of a perfectly controlled day, the seven-time world champion is comfortably installed at the head of the Rally from Croatia.

Beyond the poor strategic choice of Hyundai which helped him a lot this Saturday morning, the Habs showed solidity throughout the eight special stages on the program. In fact, he scored four scratches which allowed him to take control of the meeting.

However, the day could have turned into a nightmare when his right front tire failed during SS13. To his delight, he was only two kilometers from the finish which allowed him to limit the damage. Maybe that's the luck of the champion.

At the dawn of the final day of the rally, Sébastien Ogier dominates the general classification ahead of his teammate Elfyn Evans and Thierry Neuville (Hyundai). The member of Gazoo Racing is respectively 6 and 9 ahead of the two closest pursuers before the last four specials. Enough to look forward to a lively Sunday.

Called up to the big boys for the first time, Adrien fourmaux (M-sport) continues to impress. The Frenchman systematically beat his teammate Gus Greensmith and can boast a good 5th place at the end of Saturday. Only the big guys like Sébastien Ogier, Elfyn Evans, Thierry Neuville and Ott Tänak (Hyundai) are ahead of him overall.

Difficult day on the other hand for Pierre-Louis Loubet (2C Competition). While he did well in this rally, the Corsican finished his race in the ravine during SS14. He logically did not leave, thus ending his weekend.

In WRC2, Mads Østberg (TRT World Rally Team) definitely widened the gap. The Norwegian took advantage of the misfortunes of Nikolay Gryazin (Movisport) in the afternoon to take off. He is now 1'03" ahead of Teemu Suninen (M-Sport). Gryazin is 6rd at 3'1"25.

Leader after Yohan Rossel's crash in the morning, Kajetan Kajetanowicz asserts himself at the head of the WRC3 category. With four special stages remaining, the Pole trails the Finnish Emil Lindholm by 46 seconds and the Englishman Chris Ingram by 2'53"3.

In JWRC things have changed. The Englishman Jon Armstrong is now in the lead to the detriment of Martin Koci, who has been in the lead since the start of the weekend. The first city has a lead of 22” over the Finn Lauri Joona. The Latvian Martins Sesks is in 5rd place, almost 3 seconds behind.

See you this Sunday at 7:20 a.m. for the last day of the Croatia Rally, still on AUTOhebdo.