Volkswagen’s Sebastien Ogier has finished the opening day of the Rally of Portugal with a marginal 4.4 second lead over Citroen’s Dani Sordo and teammate Jari-Matti Latvala in third.
Ogier inherited the rally lead after Mads Ostberg, who had built a lead of 3.9s, rolled his M-Sport Ford Fiesta RS WRC into retirement after mishearing a pacenote on SS3. The Norwegian’s retirement promoted Ogier to the head of the field, with Sordo and Latvala in second and third where they remained after the day’s final SS5 Lisbon stage.
Despite Sordo’s reputation as a tarmac expert, the Spaniard headed Citroen’s assault and managed to consistently challenge the championship leader on the dusty and narrow Algarve stages by taking stage wins on SSs 3 and 4, at one point trimming the rally leader’s advantage to 2.4s.
SS5 saw the VW man push his lead back up to 4.4s, despite Sordo’s teammate, Mikko Hirvonen winning the stage by a slim 0.9s from Ogier.
Hirvonen lies in fourth overall, just 4.8s from Latvala but 16.2s from the rally lead after suffering setup issues once again with his DS3 despite “driving on the limit”. The Finn was unable to make any changes given Friday’s loop of stages are without a full service.
The M-Sport trio of Thierry Neuville, Evgeny Novikov and Nasser Al-Attiyah lie fifth, sixth and seventh with Czech Ford’s Martin Prokop in eighth. The Czech managed to leapfrog Italia Mini’s Michal Kosciuszko after the Pole suffered a loose bonnet due to a hard landing after one of SS5s jumps.
M-Sport’s Denis Kuipers rounds out the top-10 in his debut for the team.
Andreas Mikkelsen, another of the WRC’s debutantes suffered a torrid time on his first outing with the Volkswagen Motorsport II team after losing more than two minutes due to a loss of power steering on SS3. The Norwegian now lies in 16th overall.
Day 1 results – Rally Portugal
1. Ogier-Ingrassia (VW Polo Wrc) in 49'33”0
2. Sordo-Del Barrio (Citroen DS3 Wrc) – 4”4
3. Latvala-Anttila (VW Polo Wrc) – 11”4
4. Hirvonen-Lehtinen (Citroen DS3 Wrc) – 16”2
5. Neuville-Gilsoul (Ford Fiesta RS Wrc) – 30”7
6. Novikov-Minor (Ford Fiesta RS Wrc) – 1'17”0
7. Al Attiyah-Bernacchini (Ford Fiesta RS Wrc) – 2'16”4
8. Prokop-Ernst (Ford Fiesta RS Wrc) – 2'27”9
9. Kosciuszko-Szczepaniak (Mini Cooper Wrc) – 2'37”1
10. Kuipers-Bysmans (Ford Fiesta RS Wrc) – 2'48”7
Ogier inherited the rally lead after Mads Ostberg, who had built a lead of 3.9s, rolled his M-Sport Ford Fiesta RS WRC into retirement after mishearing a pacenote on SS3. The Norwegian’s retirement promoted Ogier to the head of the field, with Sordo and Latvala in second and third where they remained after the day’s final SS5 Lisbon stage.
Despite Sordo’s reputation as a tarmac expert, the Spaniard headed Citroen’s assault and managed to consistently challenge the championship leader on the dusty and narrow Algarve stages by taking stage wins on SSs 3 and 4, at one point trimming the rally leader’s advantage to 2.4s.
SS5 saw the VW man push his lead back up to 4.4s, despite Sordo’s teammate, Mikko Hirvonen winning the stage by a slim 0.9s from Ogier.
Hirvonen lies in fourth overall, just 4.8s from Latvala but 16.2s from the rally lead after suffering setup issues once again with his DS3 despite “driving on the limit”. The Finn was unable to make any changes given Friday’s loop of stages are without a full service.
The M-Sport trio of Thierry Neuville, Evgeny Novikov and Nasser Al-Attiyah lie fifth, sixth and seventh with Czech Ford’s Martin Prokop in eighth. The Czech managed to leapfrog Italia Mini’s Michal Kosciuszko after the Pole suffered a loose bonnet due to a hard landing after one of SS5s jumps.
M-Sport’s Denis Kuipers rounds out the top-10 in his debut for the team.
Andreas Mikkelsen, another of the WRC’s debutantes suffered a torrid time on his first outing with the Volkswagen Motorsport II team after losing more than two minutes due to a loss of power steering on SS3. The Norwegian now lies in 16th overall.
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| Sébastien Ogier, Volkswagen Polo (Photo: VW Motorsport) |
Day 1 results – Rally Portugal
1. Ogier-Ingrassia (VW Polo Wrc) in 49'33”0
2. Sordo-Del Barrio (Citroen DS3 Wrc) – 4”4
3. Latvala-Anttila (VW Polo Wrc) – 11”4
4. Hirvonen-Lehtinen (Citroen DS3 Wrc) – 16”2
5. Neuville-Gilsoul (Ford Fiesta RS Wrc) – 30”7
6. Novikov-Minor (Ford Fiesta RS Wrc) – 1'17”0
7. Al Attiyah-Bernacchini (Ford Fiesta RS Wrc) – 2'16”4
8. Prokop-Ernst (Ford Fiesta RS Wrc) – 2'27”9
9. Kosciuszko-Szczepaniak (Mini Cooper Wrc) – 2'37”1
10. Kuipers-Bysmans (Ford Fiesta RS Wrc) – 2'48”7