Tanak seals WRC hat-trick to close in on Neuville
Ott Tanak has completed a World Rally Championship hat-trick of event wins to move up to second place in the drivers’ standings and close to 13 points behind leader Thierry Neuville.
On Rally Turkey’s return to WRC after eight years away, the gravel event saw a huge rate of attrition but Toyota and Tanak held their nerve to take a third consecutive victory following his triumphs in Finland and Germany.
Ott Tanak has completed a World Rally Championship hat-trick of event wins to move up to second place in the drivers’ standings and close to 13 points behind leader Thierry Neuville.
On Rally Turkey’s return to WRC after eight years away, the gravel event saw a huge rate of attrition but Toyota and Tanak held their nerve to take a third consecutive victory following his triumphs in Finland and Germany.
With third place on the Power stage, behind WRC title rivals Neuville who won SS17 with Sebastien Ogier in second, Tanak has moved up to second in the standings ahead of the defending WRC champion.
Both Neuville and Ogier were forced to retire from Rally Turkey during Saturday’s gruelling stages, restarting under Rally 2 rules, with the WRC championship leader suffering a broken suspension while Ogier tumbled off on SS11.
Tactical moves by M-Sport Ford saw Elfyn Evans drop behind Ogier due to a deliberate time penalty to see the French driver move up to 10th place to take the final points place which ensured he scored equal points to Neuville after the Hyundai driver claimed victory on the Power Stage.
Toyota were given extra reason to celebrate by overhauling Hyundai at the top of the WRC manufacturers’ championship thanks to Jari-Matti Latvala taking second place behind teammate Tanak in Turkey.
Hyundai’s third driver Hayden Paddon survived the event to take a comfortable podium, his first of the year, with M-Sport Ford’s Teemu Suninen in fourth place over two minutes behind the Kiwi.
Despite picking up a hefty time penalty for a mechanical fix, two-time leader during Rally Turkey Andreas Mikkelsen had to settle for fifth place for Hyundai.
Given the high rate of attrition, Henning Solberg ended the event sixth overall in a WRC 2 car ahead of fellow Skoda driver Jan Kopecky who claimed victory in the WRC 2 class in front of Citroen’s Simone Tempestini in eighth place in the final classification.
Chris Ingram completed the WRC 2 podium on his Rally Turkey debut to score his maiden WRC points in ninth place with Ogier rounding out the top ten.
