Hyundai’s Dani Sordo increased his lead over his World Rally Championship team-mate Thierry Neuville to close out a dramatic Saturday morning at the Acropolis Rally.
Sordo, competing in a part-time campaign, inherited the rally lead when his Hyundai team-mate Ott Tanak lost time following two tyre failures on stage seven.
The Spaniard drove smartly through the two tricky gravel stages to open up a 10.3s advantage over championship leader Neuville.
Toyota’s Sebastien Ogier climbed to third [+1m41.2s] with Tanak falling to fourth [+3m35.1s] after his tyre woes. M-Sport’s Gregoire Munster leapt from seventh to fifth [+4m01.1s] in front of top WRC2 runners Sami Pajari and Robert Virves.
M-Sport Ford’s Adrien Fourmaux and Toyota’s Takamoto Katsuta rejoined the rally after their respective retirements on Friday.
Tanak generated the major headline from the morning stages when the rally leader suffered a double puncture in stage seven (Rengini, 28.67km).
He had started Saturday with a 21.8s margin over Sordo before a right rear puncture halted his progress five kilometres into the stage. The Estonian pulled to the side of the road to change the wheel.
Tanak and co-driver Martin Jarveoja only lost 1m21.6s, but the rally lead had evaporated.
To make matters worse, a second puncture arrived 10 kilometres later, this time, the front right. Tanak eventually reached the stage end losing 4m06.4s dropping him from the lead to fourth overall.
“The first one was off the rim and the second one was a bent rim,” said Tanak, who was the only driver from the five title contenders to avoid trouble on Friday.
Tanak’s double puncture handed Sordo the rally lead by 7.2s from team-mate and championship leader Thierry Neuville.
Neuville won the stage by 0.2s from Ogier, who moved to third following Tanak’s problems.
The rocky and abrasive conditions were replaced by a sandy road surface to add another challenge for the crews to tackle in stage eight (Thiva, 20.95km),
The soft road surface made rotating the car difficult with Fourmaux and Ogier both comparing the stage to like “driving on a beach”.
Tyre strategies differed among the crews but it was Ogier, who opted for a hard and soft mix, that won the stage by 7.4s from the hard tyre shod Sordo.
“It is not fun to drive this stage, it is like driving on the beach. Full of sand everywhere, I’m fighting to turn the car everywhere," said Ogier.
Sordo’s effort was 3.1s faster than Neuville, who was also running four hard compound tyres. He completed the run after bumping his head while making changes to his i20 N that required a plaster to be fitted above his right eye.
“I was working on the car before and I hit my head,” said Sordo.
“I was thinking in case I need to change the wheel during the stage, I couldn’t put the jack in. I was playing a little bit and [then there was a] bump.”
Neuville conceded that he had opted for more cautious tyre strategy and explained:
“We are on full hards, we took a safer choice this morning. I’m trying to enjoy the car more than yesterday, we changed the setup and it is much better,” said Neuville.
The crews will tackle three more stages this afternoon before a super special stage near Athens tonight.
