Sometimes motorsport offers truly singular, almost unexpected situations that seem paradoxical. Instead, as in this case, it’s all true. Kalle Rovanpera grabbed the leadership of the Polish Rally in Special Stage 10, the 19.90 kilometer Goldap 1.
In case the name of this stage doesn’t ring a bell, it’s the stage where, during reconnaissance, Sébastien Ogier had an accident with another car that sidelined him for the weekend.
Toyota Gazoo Racing was forced to call up Kalle Rovanpera at the last minute and on the first lap of Goldap the reigning world champion overtook Andreas Mikkelsen to become the new leader of the event.
Rovanpera won the race with a margin of 3 tenths over Elfyn Evans, who rose to second in the general classification after in turn overtaking Andreas Mikkelsen. For the Hyundai driver this start to the day was very disappointing.
In Goldap, the Norwegian did not go beyond the fifth fastest time, doing worse than both Thierry Neuville and Ott Tanak, his teammates who had started testing much earlier than him. This is a clear symptom of how Mikkelsen is not yet ready to fight for the victory, and this weekend at Hyundai Motorsport he would have been very useful.
For Evans, climbing to second place in the overall standings is a godsend. Thanks to this result, he sees the opportunity to nibble away several points from Thierry Neuville, who, in turn, managed to gain a position by overtaking Gregoire Munster to climb to sixth place.
If the Belgian wants to gain further positions, he will have to push hard to recover the 17″3 that separate him from Martins Sesks and gain fifth place in the general classification. However, it will be difficult, because the Latvian continues to perform very well, despite not managing to keep pace with a good Adrien Fourmaux, fourth.
In WRC2 Sami Pajari continues his march towards success, increasing his advantage over his closest rival, hometown hero Kajetan Kajetanowicz, second in class at 16.6 seconds from the top. Josh McErlean returns to third, but is in full battle with Robert Virves for the lowest step of the podium: there are just 3 tenths of a second between the two.
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