With a slender lead of 2.8 seconds in Rally Sweden, the second round of the WRC, Japan’s Takamoto Katsuta and his Northern Ireland co-driver Aaron Johnston (Toyotas GR Yaris Rally12) are locked in battle with team mates Elfyn Evans/Scott Martin with Finland’s Esapekka Lappi/Enni Malkonen completing an all-Toyota top three.
Jon Armstrong/Shane Byrne (Ford Puma Rally1) lead the Irish and M-Sport Ford challenge in eighth place.
Evans set the pace on the day’s opener (SS2) to move into a 5.6s lead that he extended to 14.5s by the service break. Team mate Oliver Solberg suffered a half spin and a stall on the opening stage and on the next (SS3) was extremely fortunate to survive a trip into the snowbank where he punctured the front left tyre and lost over half a minute, dropping to sixth – 37.5s behind Evans.
Katsuta and Thierry Neuville (Hyundai i20 Rally1) were both off briefly at another spot, the former still managed to post the second fastest stage time to claim second overall 11.5s behind Evans but the latter lost over a minute.
Tyre pressures were a big concern for the M-Sport Ford team. Latvian Martin Sesks had a puncture on SS2 and two on SS3 and although he got the car through SS4, he retired at service due to further issues.
McErlean completed SS3 with rear deflations – all related to pressures as team principal Richard Millener commented, “We may well have made a bit of an error and it has cost us dearly.”
Evans, Katsuta and Pajari completed a Toyota lock-out of the top three. The Hyundai Motorsport challenge was led by Esapekka Lappi in fourth.
During the afternoon and late evening where the final two stages were in darkness, Evans suffered from running first on the road and Katsuta moved in front after SS7 and extended his advantage on the day’s final stage.
McErlean lost time when he forgot to remove the blanking across the radiator ahead of the final stage. Armstrong had a front left wheel puncture on SS7 but remained upbeat. “Pretty solid day, really happy with our split times pace and to get a fastest split time is a maybe half a tick, so we will try and keep pushing and see what we can do.”
1. T. Katsuta/A. Johnston (Toyota GR Yaris Rally1) 1h. 10m. 33.7s; 2. E. Evans/S. Martin (Toyota GR Yaris Rally1)+2.8s; 1h. 10m. 36.5s; 2. 3. S. Pajari/M. Salminen (Toyota GR Yaris Rally1)+22.2s; 4. E. Lappi/E. Malkonen (Hyundai i20 N Rally1)+45.9s; 5. A. Fourmaux/A. Coria (Hyundai i20 N Rally1)+50.3s; 6. O. Solberg/E. Edmondson (Toyota GR Yaris Rally1)+51.0s; 7. T. Neuville/M. Wydaeghe (Hyundai i20 N Rally1)+1m. 43.8s; 8. J. Armstrong/S. Byrne (Ford Puma Rally1)+2m. 40.3s; 9. J. McErlean/E. Treacy (Ford Puma Rally1)+3m. 31.8s; 10. R. Korhonen/A. Viinikka (Toyota GR Yaris Rally2)+4m. 41.9s.
