Toyota’s Sebastien Ogier will take a slender lead over Hyundai’s Ott Tanak as 14s separated the top three heading into the final four stages of the Central European Rally.
The eight-time world champion won two of the three afternoon asphalt stages to extend his advantage over Tanak to 5.2s, with Toyota’s Elfyn Evans in third and 14s back.
Ogier’s performance earned the Frenchman 18 provisional championship points to boost Toyota’s manufacturers’ title hopes, while Tanak picked up 15 and Evans claimed 13 points.
Championship leader Thierry Neuville ended the day in fourth, 39.8s back on the overall lead, to claim 10 provisional championship points, after two errors in the morning's stage 11 cost him half a minute and the rally lead.
It proved to be a setback for the Belgian who can seal a maiden world title if he can outscore Tanak by two points.
Toyota’s Takamoto Katsuta, team-mate Sami Pajari and M-Sport’s Gregoire Munster rounded out the top seven. M-Sport’s Adrien Fourmaux retired from the day’s action after damaging the rear of his Ford Puma in stage 10.
Neuville’s demise in the morning put attention firmly on the fight for the rally lead between Ogier, Tanak and Evans as the trio had been separated by 8.1s.
The afternoon’s first stage, a second pass through Granit und Wald (20.05km), went the way of Tanak as the Hyundai driver repeated the stage win from the morning pass.
The stage was mostly dry, unlike the morning, but there were still a few “sketchy” damp patches according to Tanak. The 2019 world champion’s effort was 3.4s faster than rally leader Ogier, which reduced the Toyota driver’s lead to a mere 1.1s.
Evans also pushed hard on the dirty road, matching Ogier’s time to remain poised in third overall.
Resigned to the fact that the gap to lead group was too large to claw back, Neuville delivered a steady run to clock the fourth-fastest time ahead of Katsuta, Pajari, Mikkelsen and Munster.
Katsuta did have 16 seconds added to his overall time after he was found to have exceeded the speed limit by 8km/h through the virtual chicane in the morning pass through the test.
Ogier responded to Tanak’s push in stage 13 (Beyond Borders, 24.33km) by winning the test and crucially taking three seconds out of his Hyundai rival. The road was much drier compared to the morning pass.
"We had to react, Ott was fast in the previous, we had to be fast on this. It is a drier road, so we have to be better on it,” said Ogier.
Neuville was Ogier’s nearest rival on the stage, 0.9s adrift, as the WRC points leader focused on bringing the car home, as both Tanak and Evans dropped time to Ogier.
“In the dry conditions, a lot of markings have improved I had a bit of hesitation in there. I should learn to ignore what my old man [father, Gwyndaf Evans] says sometimes!” Evans said. “He's doing my gravel notes, you have to take everything with a pinch of salt but it's not always that easy to do.”
Ogier managed to pull further clear of Tanak on the final stage of the day after eclipsing the Hyundai driver's time by 1.1s, with Evans two seconds adrift of the pace to set up an intriguing three-way fight for the victory on Sunday.
In WRC2, Nikolay Gryazin opened up a 1m50.8s lead over Filip Mares, while Yohan Rossel’s championship hopes are all but over after a mistake in the morning left him 11th in class and 15m40.7s in arrears.
The rally will conclude after four Sunday stages comprising of 54.04km.
