By Paul Evans
Elfyn Evans has finished Friday’s dramatic leg of Wales Rally GB in eighth place, after a near miss in Penmachno forest damaged his chances of winning Britain’s round of the FIA World Rally Championship this year.
Evans put last night’s poor opening stage at Oulton Park behind him by jumping from 22nd to sixth position with fastest time on Friday’s opening stage, Elsi 1, in his M-Sport Ford Fiesta WRC. Conditions were atrocious, with mud and standing water making the forest roads extremely slippery, and on the next stage in Penmachno forest he slid wide, clipped a bank and collected a puncture – with the 43 seconds lost dropping him down to 12th.
Fourth fastest through Dyfnant (SS4) and another fastest time in Aberhirnant put Evans and co-driver Scott Martin back into the top 10, as crews arrived back in Llandudno for mid-day service.
“Things started well this morning, but then on the second stage we ran wide and picked up a puncture,” confirmed Evans. “We lost a fair bit of time with that, but otherwise, the driving has been good and it’s great to see that we were able to get straight back on the pace.”
His good progress continued – moving up to ninth after SS6 (Elsi 2) and eighth after SS7 (Penmachno 2). As night time approached, rivals running ahead were able to complete SS9 (Dyfnant 2) in daylight, while Evans was left struggling to judge the levels of grip in darkness, yet he maintained position heading into the day’s final stage. And second fastest time through the day’s final Aberhirnant 2 test saw Evans hold onto eighth place, 51.8 seconds off the lead.
That lead is held by Ott Tänak/Martin Järveoja after Friday’s stages in their Toyota Yaris WRC, the Estonian crew a mere 3.4 seconds ahead of Sébastien Ogier/Julien Ingrassia (Citroën C3 WRC), while Kris Meeke/Seb Marshall (Toyota Yaris WRC) slipped from first to third on tonight’s final stage. Thierry Neuville/Nicolas Gilsoul are next in a Hyundai i20 Coupe WRC, with the top four crews separated by just 8.4 seconds.
Petter Solberg started the day in third overall, but his fight was always going to be for WRC2 honours. Together with his Newtown-based co-driver Phil Mills, the 2003 world champions enjoyed a great day in their Volkswagen Polo GTI R5, as their ‘farewell tour’ continues at speed. They’ll start tomorrow’s leg second in class.
Friday saw a number of big name retirements, including Esapekka Lappi/Janne Ferm who crashed their Citroën C3 WRC out on SS6, while Jari-Matti Latvala/Miikka Anttila rolled their Toyota Yaris WRC on the very next stage.
Having started the day in seventh position, double British Rally Champion Matt Edwards hit a rock in the road in Penmachno and broke a traction control arm bolt on his Hyundai i20 R5. He and co-driver Mark Glennerster worked in the mud on the side of the stage to repair the car for 20 minutes, but despite their best efforts their fix failed in Dyfnant and they were forced to call it a day.
“Of course we are very disappointed, not least for those who have helped us get here, but we are encouraged by our early pace which was cool, calm and comfortable in the Hyundai i20 R5,” said Edwards. “For the first time in the car, all credit to the Philip Case Rally Sport team, who did us a set-up on paper with no pre-event test.”
Tom Cave/Dale Furniss lost time in the morning when a broken wire affected their identical Hyundai i20 R5’s anti-lag and boost settings. The Aberdyfi driver continued and finished the day a magnificent 15th overall.
The first full day of competition hasn’t been without its operational problems, with the morning’s run through Aberhirnant forest cancelled because of spectators standing in dangerous positions, Penmachno 2 stopped after Latvala’s accident and not restarted, spectators turned away from full car parks, traffic problems on the A55 near the host town of Llandudno and North Wales Police receiving complains regarding the manner of driving of some of the competitors.
But if crews thought today was tough (and it was), tomorrow’s gruelling ‘Super Saturday’ is even harder as the event moves into mid-Wales and the legendary forests of Dyfi, Myherin and Sweet Lamb Hafren. The first car leaves Llandudno at just before 6am, and all seven stages and 151kms, including tomorrow night’s blast along Colwyn Bay promenade, are tackled without a service halt. In fact, crews won’t see their mechanics until well after dark, as the first car isn’t due to arrive back at Llandudno until just before 8pm.