Hyundai’s Adrien Fourmaux reclaimed the Rally Portugal lead after overnight leader Oliver Solberg struggled for pace across Friday morning’s loop of stages.
Fourmaux started the day 3.4 seconds behind Solberg, but was able to leapfrog the Toyota driver in the opening stage of Friday’s mammoth seven-stage itinerary.
Fourmaux delivered strong pace across the three stages, posting top three times in each test to open up a 7.7s lead as the crews headed to the midday remote service, where only minimal car changes can be carried out.
“It’s a very good start to the rally. We have had some good strategy decisions and that was a team effort. Very positive,” said Fourmaux.
The 7.7s advantage was over Toyota’s Sami Pajari, who emerged as the star of the morning loop.
The Finn struggled for balance on Thursday and was sitting in sixth, but some small set up changes overnight to his GR Yaris significantly improved his performance. Pajari set fastest times in stage four (Mortagua) and stage five (Arganil) to climb into second position.
“Yesterday wasn’t the best. We tried to find something more for today,” said Pajari. “At least the feeling is really nice, it feels good in the car. The times have been nice today. We will try to keep the same speed.”
Sebastien Ogier was frustrated by the handling of his Toyota
Photo by: Toyota Racing
Nine-time world champion and seven-time Portugal winner Sebastien Ogier was frustrated by the handling of his GR Yaris throughout the morning. Improvements were found as the loop progressed, which helped the Frenchman to third – 8.0s from the lead.
“We need to make some changes because the pace is not what I’d like to have,” said Ogier.
Hyundai’s Thierry Neuville was among those fighting his car as the Belgian reported understeer and oversteer issues. However, the 2024 world champion managed to win stage six (Lousa) by 0.4s from Ogier. It was enough to move into fourth overall, 8.2s from the lead.
After topping the times on Thursday night, Solberg dropped to fifth overall after struggling to extract pace from his GR Yaris. The Swede described the feeling in the car as “horrendous”, and felt he had made an error taking more hard than soft compound tyres.
“Yesterday had much more grip and the car was better. Not a perfect tyre choice, but that was my mistake,” said Solberg.
Solberg wasn’t the only driver to rue an incorrect tyre decision. Hyundai’s Dani Sordo had wanted to take more softs than hards, but ended up with the opposite after a team mistake at last night’s tyre fitting zone.
The Spaniard was clearly frustrated by the mistake and was fortunate to survive an overshoot that he felt was caused by the lack of grip generated by the tyres.
Sordo ended the looping eighth [+47.3s] behind the Toyota’s of Elfyn Evans [+15.2s] and Takamoto Katsuta [+34.7s], who faced the worst of the conditions opening the road at the front.
Josh McErlean headed M-Sport-Ford’s charge in ninth overall, 3.8s ahead of team-mate Jon Armstrong with the third Ford Puma of Martins Sesks in 11th [+1m01.4s].
Crews will tackle four more stages this afternoon.
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– The Autosport.com Team
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