Sami Pajari superbly leads the Croatia Rally after a demanding opening day of contrasting fortunes for the TOYOTA GAZOO Racing World Rally Team drivers.
The rally’s move from the Croatian capital Zagreb to the coastal city of Rijeka for this edition has brought spectacular new terrain and challenging new roads. Friday’s opening leg was formed by four all-new stages on the Istrian peninsula, each to be run twice.
Championship leader Elfyn Evans made a strong start to the rally, winning the opening two stages to open a lead of 15.8 seconds over Pajari.
Oliver Solberg meanwhile started brightly but came unstuck just four kilometres into the first stage, running wide and hitting a bank. This spun his car across to the other side of the road where it got stuck, forcing him and co-driver Elliott Edmondson to stop for the day. Evans and his co-driver Scott Martin would later go off the road in SS3, bringing their day to an early close. Both Evans and Solberg are set to restart the rally on Saturday.
Pajari therefore took over the lead, and then extended his advantage above 10s by winning the fourth and final stage of the morning as well as the opening test of the afternoon. His margin was reduced once more in the following two stages before he responded with a stunning stage win in the day’s final test. This extended Pajari’s advantage to 13.7s over Thierry Neuville (Hyundai) as he leads a WRC round overnight for the first time in his career.
Fresh from his maiden victory last time out in Kenya, Takamoto Katsuta is also part of the lead battle after a strong and consistent day, which he finished just 0.9s behind Neuville in third overall.
GR Yaris Rally2 driver Alejandro Cachón is third in WRC2 and eighth overall, with Roope Korhonen rounding out the class top five and overall top 10. TGR WRC Challenge Program driver Yuki Yamamoto also had a solid first day back in competitive action after two rallies out and sits sixth among the Rally2 drivers.
Quotes:
Juha Kankkunen (Deputy Team Principal)
“It’s been a day of mixed emotions for us today. Of course, it was a pity to have Oliver and Elfyn drop out of the fight so soon, but this is rallying and these things do happen sometimes. These stages today were brand new for all of the drivers and they were clearly very tricky roads. At the same time, we have Sami leading the rally and Taka in third, so we are very much in the fight still. Both of them drove really well today in the conditions, consistent and without mistakes, and hopefully they can carry on like this tomorrow.”
Elfyn Evans (Driver car 33)
“We had a really good start this morning, with a good feeling in the car and good speed in the first two stages. Then, unfortunately, a bit of a disaster for us when we slid off the road on the third stage. We just got caught out; the corner was a bit tighter than expected and we came into it too fast. We’re very disappointed that we couldn’t use the potential we had and we’re very sorry for the team. The target now is to find good form ahead of Sunday and see what we can recover in terms of points.”
Oliver Solberg (Driver car 99)
“It was really disappointing what happened in the first stage this morning. It was my first time with this hard tyre on the car in rally conditions and I was maybe too optimistic considering that limited experience. I was just a bit too fast in this corner, misjudged the grip that I had, and ran wide and touched the wall. I’m very sorry for the team, but I will try to learn from this. We’ve had a good feeling with the car and tomorrow is a chance to learn some more and get ready to aim for points on Sunday.”
Takamoto Katsuta (Driver car 18)
“We saw a lot happening already in the morning loop, which was quite tough for the team. I was sorry to see Oliver and Elfyn off the road, and I knew then that it would be important for me to keep going. The stages were very tricky with a lot of grip changes, so it was easy to make a mistake. I wasn’t taking any risks but I was quite happy with the feeling and the pace that we found and I think we were managing things quite well. There’s still a long way to go and anything can happen: tomorrow could be even more challenging with more mud on the road.”
Sami Pajari (Driver car 5)
“It has been really tricky out there today and we could see already this morning that it was really easy to make a mistake. I wasn’t feeling completely comfortable to begin with this morning, but I think we could drive with quite a clever and consistent pace and that paid off for us. Then in the afternoon I felt like things were much more under control and I was able to enjoy it more, especially this last stage of the day. It’s a good feeling to be in the lead tonight but I know that there’s still a really long way to go. I’m sure that tomorrow will not be any easier and that it will be another challenging day.”
End of day one (Friday):
1 Sami Pajari/Marko Salminen (Toyota GR YARIS Rally1) 1h12m18.5s
2 Thierry Neuville/Martijn Wydaeghe (Hyundai i20 N Rally1) +13.7s
3 Takamoto Katsuta/Aaron Johnston (Toyota GR YARIS Rally1) +14.6s
4 Hayden Paddon/John Kennard (Hyundai i20 N Rally1) +1m15.0s
5 Adrien Fourmaux/Alexandre Coria (Hyundai i20 N Rally1) +1m54.6s
6 Yohan Rossel/Arnaud Dunand (Lancia Ypsilon Rally2 HF Integrale) +2m45.9s
7 Nikolay Gryazin/Konstantin Aleksandrov (Lancia Ypsilon Rally2 HF Integrale) +3m08.0s
8 Alejandro Cachón/Borja Rozada (Toyota GR Yaris Rally2) +3m27.9s
9 Léo Rossel/Guillaume Mercoiret (Citroën C3 Rally2) +3m35.1s
10 Roope Korhonen/Anssi Viinikka (Toyota GR Yaris Rally2) +3m47.0s
49 Elfyn Evans/Scott Martin (Toyota GR YARIS Rally1) +59m34.5s
51 Oliver Solberg/Elliott Edmondson (Toyota GR YARIS Rally1) +1h19m34.5s
(Results as of 20:00 on Friday, for the latest results please visit www.wrc.com)
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