By Paul Evans

Elfyn Evans is enjoying a fantastic high-speed and faultless run so far on Rally Germany, completing the first full day of action in fourth position in his M-Sport Ford Fiesta WRC.

Having finished last night’s short opening superspecial in 20th place, Evans and co-driver Dan Barritt made rapid progress up the leaderboard over today’s six vineyard stages. Ninth after SS2, sixth after SS3 and fourth after SS5, the Dolgellau driver has been on sensational form.

In a close fight for position, Evans finished Friday’s stages just 10.4 seconds behind FIA World Rally Championship leader Thierry Neuville (Hyundai), one second ahead of Jari-Matti Latvala (Toyota) and 37.8 seconds off the overall Rally Germany leader Ott Tänak (Toyota).

“I was hoping we could do something in here,” said Evans, after taking 0.6 seconds off Latvala on the final stage of the day. “I wanted to push and we had a clean run.”

Saturday’s day of action is not for the faint hearted, with eight long stages covering almost 100 miles – many of which take place in the feared military camp of Baumholder, where avoiding the massive hinkelstein kerbs, which are designed to keep tanks on the road, adds to the challenge. The day also includes two runs through Panzerplatte which, at 24 miles, is the longest stage of the event.