At the end of Saturday, Kalle Rovanpera reels in claiming his third victory of the season with Toyota as Sebastien Ogier and Martins Sesks following him.
Kalle Rovanpera continued his dominant performance on Saturday afternoon as he was the fastest driver in SS13, SS14 and SS16.
Sebastien Ogier holds his second place and was able to be faster than the third Martins Sesks with their gap being at 4,7 seconds. Moreover, the Frenchman set the fastest time in Stage 15.
Sesks managed to keep Ott Tanak behind at fourth place which means that the youngster stole some valuable points from the championship contender.
Tanak received a notional time in Stage 14 as he was forced to stop after an advertising arch collapsing on his car. The incident was caused by Elfyn Evans who had a scary moment in that stage and tried to save his Yaris from a potential crash. Finally, there was a late drama for him in Stage 1 as the driveshaft or the gearbox was broken after a landing resulting in having an impact with a hay bale and then stalling on the reverse.
Adrien Fourmaux completes the top five and was happier with the behavior of his Puma on second loop of Saturday compared to the first loop, but he is now closer to Tanak after the end of SS16 as 8,4 seconds separate them.
Evans remains in sixth place and almost had a crash in Stage 14 as his Yaris came wide in a left-hander and took out a banner before coming off the road, dipping around an arch and rejoining the stage.
Takamoto Katsuta lost ground from his teammate Evans as their margin is at 11,7 seconds.
Apart from Tanak, Katsuta and Fourmaux also were given a notional time in Stage 14 as there was an interruption due to safety reasons.
Thierry Neuville was not able to catch Katsuta on the classification and to score some valuable points for the WRC title bid while he reported understeer in Stage 14.
Esapekka Lappi is still behind his teammate, but he increased further his gap from the tenth Gregoire Munster who survived from a scary moment in Stage 13.
The driver from Luxemburg landed into the grass after a jump in Stage 13 and had a big impact to the front right of his Puma coming over the crest. In addition to that, he saud at the end of Stage 14 that it was difficult for him to drive the Puma without the front splitter while he lost the power in Stage 15.
Watch below the stage times:
Watch below the overall classification after the end of SS16:
Photo Credits: Toyota
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