Hyundai on top at Rally Sardinia as M-Sport suffers nightmare triple retirement

Hyundai started its quest for a first World Rally Championship win of 2025 by setting the pace at Rally Sardinia, while M-Sport suffered a nightmare triple retirement that included a roll for Martins Sesks.   

Hyundai ended Friday morning’s trio of gravel stages with Adrien Fourmaux leading team-mate and reigning world champion Thierry Neuville by 2.9 seconds, with Toyota’s Sebastien Ogier third and 8.1s adrift, and 0.9s ahead of Hyundai’s Ott Tanak in fourth.

Forumaux, starting seventh on the road, made the most of his position to leap into the lead after winning stage three, Sa Conchedda 1 – 27.95 km.

“Half the job [of being in the lead of the rally at the end of Friday] is done but there is still a long way to go and the gaps are really small, but I’m pleased with the morning,” said Fourmaux.

Eight-time world champion Ogier grabbed the early lead after a stunning run through the opening Arzachena 1 – 13.97 km, despite the disadvantage of being third on the road. Considering his road position, Ogier was content with his morning effort.

“I think it has been a very good run. It is a good start. Our team had a good brainstorming session trying to analyse what we can change for this rally, and so far I’m more happy with the car [than in Portugal],” said Ogier, who won last time out in Portugal. 

“We are still missing the information from testing the tyres and maybe the soft would have helped more.”

Tanak set a blistering pace in stage two to move to within a second of the rally lead, but the 2019 world champion admitted he was enduring an “incredible struggle” trying to rotate his i20 N.

Toyota’s Sami Pajari ran as high as third as the Finn capitalised on his road position. A front-right puncture in stage three demoted him to fifth [+11.0s], ahead of team-mates Takamoto Katsuta [+15.5s], Kalle Rovanpera [+30.6s] and Elfyn Evans [+41.2s].

Rovanpera and Evans bore the brunt of the road sweeping effect. The former lamented a lack of confidence behind the wheel of his GR Yaris, while championship leader Evans knew he would be in for a rough ride starting first on the road.

“I think it [the loss] was a bit more than expected. I was losing too much time on the first one through not being fast enough and being confident with the car. But apart from that, we did what we could,” said Rovanpera.

Evans added: “[The time loss] was as expected, the clearing effect was quite big, especially the last one of the loop. I think some things have improved [on the car] from Portugal, but it is hard to gauge with the road position.”

M-Sport reeling from disastrous start 

Joshua McErlean, Eoin Treacy, M-Sport Ford World Rally Team Ford Puma Rally1

Photo by: M-Sport

M-Sport is hopeful two of its three cars will rejoin the rally tomorrow after suffering a shock triple retirement on stage two. 

The fast and particularly narrow stage witnessed Gregoire Munster and Joshua McErlean clip rocks destroying their right and left rear suspension on their upgraded Ford Puma Rally1 cars respectively, while team-mate Sesks and co-driver Renars Francis emerged unscathed from a frightening high-speed roll following a jump.

“I wouldn’t say it was bad but it is just disappointing,” said M-Sport team principal Rich Millener.

“It is nothing unexpected as the guys are wanting to progress as the year goes by. Sometimes you need to go through the pain of a retirement like this to learn from it. They knew they couldn’t do what they have done, but they have done it and now they learn from that.

“I think two of the three [cars] will be ok, Martins’ [car] I’m not so confident to be honest as there are a lot of expensive parts that have been damaged, and this calendar is now brutal with events every two weeks.

“I will have a look but right now the sensible decision in my head is to strip and repair the car here while we have the resources. 

“We could spend a lot of money on it to get back but what are we going to achieve being first on the road for two days, there is nothing really to gain. All the repairs we do here we have to do again back in the UK to make sure they are perfect.”