Rovanperä drove four bottom times on Friday.
Toyota’s Kalle Rovanperä leads the Central European World Rally Championship by far after Friday’s driving day.
Rovanperä, aiming to secure the world championship, drove no fewer than four bottom times on the Czech asphalt on Friday, and the Finnish driver leads his World Championship contender Elfyn Evans already in 47.2 seconds.
Hyundai, which is second in the rally Thierry Neuville is 36.4 seconds behind Rovanperä. Evans is third. Rovanperä will secure his second consecutive world championship if he finishes ahead of his teammate Evans in the race.
Evans was unable to match Rovanperä’s pace at all in the last two special stages of the day. In two stages, the Finnish comet opened an additional gap to Evans by almost 20 seconds.
“This day was really challenging. Fortunately, the weather was on our side for once in terms of starting position, it was good to start the stages as the first car. We can be happy about today”, Rovanperä was happy in the World Series interview.
In the eighth special test, which ended the driving day, Rovanperä narrowly finished second, when Neuville defeated the Finn by 1.1 seconds.
Hyundai’s Teemu Suninen is seventh in the race, a good two and a half minutes behind Rovanperää. Esapekka Lappi drove out in the fifth special test, and the Finn’s Hyundai was in a bad shape.
The penultimate round of the World Cup season continues on Saturday with six special stages, which will be run in Austria and Germany. On the final day, Sunday, there are four special exams in the program.
#Rally #Kalle #Rovanperä #close #world #championship
