6, like no other. Sébastien Ogier, navigated by Vincent Landais, succeeded. He won the Rally of Portugal, the fifth round of the 2024 WRC, signing the second consecutive victory after the one obtained at the Rally of Croatia and became the most successful on Portuguese soil. No one, apart from him, has ever managed to win this event 6 times. Markku Alen, in fact, is now stuck at 5.
Ogier further enters history thanks to a weekend in which he was perfect, also taking victory number 60 of his extraordinary career. He made very good use of his excellent starting position on dirt to climb into the top positions, then fought all Saturday morning with Ott Tanak.
Finally, when the Estonian slowed down due to a slow puncture on the last stage of yesterday’s morning lap, Ogier took the lead and never left it. He built an advantage that was certainly not significant, but enough to keep his rival from Hyundai Motorsport at a distance and take home the victory.
An important victory for him, but also for Toyota Gazoo Racing, which without Ogier would have faced one of the worst weekends since it returned to the WRC, i.e. since 2017. All the other drivers lined up – all 4 in Portugal – had made mistakes when they retired, or they never found themselves truly competitive to fight and conquer important positions.
Kalle Rovanpera retired on SS11 due to a mistake just as he was leading the race. Takamoto Katsuta broke his right rear suspension in the following test, retiring as well. Elfyn Evans never found a rhythm, always sailing in the last positions among the Rally1s. The final blow to his hopes of being able to take big points came this morning, when during SS21 he had to slow down due to the engine overheating of his GR Yaris Rally1, which caused him to lose the “Special Sunday” points.
Despite the lack of victory, Hyundai Motorsport’s weekend was very productive. Double podium with second place obtained by Ott Tanak and third by Therry Neuville, all culminated by Dani Sordo’s fifth overall (fourth until the end on Saturday, therefore with a higher score) which gave a good dose of points to the team Korean in the chase for Toyota Gazoo Racing and what would be the third World Constructors’ title in its history.
Tanak, thanks to this result, took important points to relaunch himself and relaunch his title ambitions, but the one who came out best of all was, somewhat surprisingly, Thierry Neuville. The Belgian managed to finish on the podium despite having to open all Friday’s practice as the world championship leader. And it was precisely that day, the first stage, that allowed Neuville to remain close to the leaders and then to exploit the errors and retirements of others, protected admirably by Dani Sordo, the third rider that all the teams would like to be able to count among their crews.
To seal a high-level weekend, Neuville also managed to take second place in the “Special Sunday”, the ranking dedicated to the last stage of the event, taking 6 points and, last but not least, the 5 points coming from victory in the Power Stage, Fafe 2 topped off with a spectacular jump.
Behind the Belgian, in the general classification, was a still excellent Adrien Fourmaux, who has now become more concrete even on dirt roads. Fourth place is an excellent result for the general classification. It’s true that second place this weekend allowed Ott Tanak to overtake him and move up to third, but the Frenchman from M-Sport is still very close to the Estonian, just 8 points, and the awareness of having grown further.
As already mentioned, Dani Sordo once again proved to be the perfect third driver thanks to a great team effort in which he defended Neuville and brought home very important points, also finishing ahead of Elfyn Evans and, therefore, helping once both Neuville and Hyundai more in the run-up to their respective World Championships.
In this regard, Neuville rose to 110 points against 86 for Evans and 79 for Ott Tanak. 24 important points, which will allow the Belgian to manage the next events, remembering that he will always be forced to open all the Friday specials. Not a small problem, but one that he was able to face in Portugal like never before. Hyundai Motorsport, however, overtakes Toyota Gazoo Racing in the Constructors’ World Championship. The Alzenau team now leads with 219 points against the 215 of the Japanese team. M-Sport Ford is at 116 in third place.
Jan Solans managed to come out on top in a splendid two-man battle with Josh McErlean to win the WRC2 classification. The Spaniard, at the wheel of the first Toyota GR Yaris Rally2, signed a great finish to the day with which he beat his rival after an exchange of positions during the second half of the race that seemed interminable.
Tremendous weekend however for the TokSport team, considering that first Oliver Solberg, then Gus Greensmith, were forced to retire just as they were leading the race. Solberg was betrayed by a lack of attention: he saw Rovanpera stopped after the accident and, a few tens of meters later, he crashed and retreated.
Greensmith, however, made a mistake in the middle of a forest, going wide on a right-handed curve and getting stuck in a mound of dirt raised above the ground. All this, in a place without spectators. A real joke. Yohan Rossel wasn’t doing well either, suffering a puncture and then a penalty.
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