Rally Chile - 1st Day - 1st Loop: Evans leads the 1-2-3 for Toyota as Sesks retired on the road section

 

At the end of Friday morning, Elfyn Evans takes an early lead with Kalle Rovanpera and Sami Pajari following him.

Elfyn Evans stole Sebastien Ogier's lead at the end of Stage 3 taking adavantage over his teammate's problem while he was the fastest driver in Stage 2. 

Kalle Rovanpera follows his teammate for 2,2 seconds and managed to be the fastest driver in Stage 3 despite the fact that he was struggling with his Yaris. In fact, Rovanpera was fastest by 0,1 second over Evans on the final morning stage.

Sami Pajari does the 1-2-3 for Toyota Gazoo Racing WRT on his second outing of the season with the Yaris.

Gregoire Munster comes right behind Pajari for three tenths of a second and is the best M-Sport Ford driver so far.

Ott Tanak completes the top five, but he will chase Munster for the fourth place as their gap is only at 0,4 seconds.

Only one tenth of a second separate the sixth Adrien Fourmaux from Tanak and both of them will give a fight for the fourth position on Friday afternoon.

Thierry Neuville is in seventh place overall and lost many seconds due to the fact that he had to clean the roads for the following drivers.

Esapekka Lappi, Nikolay Gryazin and Gus Greensmith complete the top ten.

EP was third overall at the end of Stage 1, but he dropped to eighth since the end of SS2. However, he suffered from a front left puncture in Stage 3.

Sebastien Ogier was leading Rally Chile until the end of Stage 2, but he was forced to stop in SS3 when he came round a fast right hander and lost the rear of his Yaris. Nevertheless, he managed to continue, but he he had to stop and to change a puncture 4.4Km into SS3.

Martins Sesks was tenth at the end of Stage 2 running with the non-hybrid Puma, but he clipped a bank 11.2Km into SS3 and stopped to change a wheel resulting in dropping more than five minuetes. However, he was forced to retire on the road section as he was not able to return back to the service park due to lack of tyres.

Watch below the stage times:

Watch below the overall classification after the end of SS3:

Photo Credits: Toyota