Ott Tänak has secured victory at the Ypres Rally and further reduced the WRC gap to Kalle Rovanperä – WRC leader with consolation Powerstage
Hyundai driver Ott Tänak held his nerve to secure his third win of the 2022 World Rally Championship season. The Estonian held off rival Elfyn Evans on the final day to win the Ypres Rally in Belgium by five seconds over the Toyota driver.
The 2019 world champion came under pressure from Evans once again on Sunday morning, but managed to salvage his lead to the finish. For Tänak, it is already the second victory in a row after the Rally Finland a fortnight ago.
Tänak and his co-driver Martin Järveoja showed a flawless performance from start to finish. The Estonian was one of the candidates for victory right from the start and finished Friday only 2.5 seconds behind his team-mate Thierry Neuville, who had led his home race.
On Saturday, Tänak briefly took the lead from Neuville before the latter set a couple of consecutive stage best times to pull away. A gearbox problem seemed to further reduce the WRC runner-up’s chances of victory, leaving him 18.3 seconds behind at one stage – until Neuville drove into a ditch after a driving error and retired.
Yet another flawless performance from @OttTanak & Martin Järveoja WRC WRCLive YpresRally @HMSGOfficial pic. twitter.com/Zh5ukH9CUh
– WRC – FIA World Rally Championship (@OfficialWRC) August 21, 2022
Once back in the lead, Tänak was able to keep Evans behind him, who struggled to find the sweet spot in his GR Yaris for most of the rally. The Welshman lost time to a puncture and received a ten-second penalty after a timing error by his co-driver, but finished the event with five stage wins.
Third place went to Toyota’s Esapekka Lappi, who managed to stay out of trouble in a rally with a high retirement rate. It was the second podium finish in a row for the Finn, having already finished third in his home event in Finland.
Early exit for World Championship leader Rovanperä
For WRC leader Kalle Rovanperä the rally was already over on Friday after the first really big mistake this season. The Finn overturned in the lead on the second stage after misjudging a bend.
Rovanperä re-entered the rally after repairing his badly damaged GR Yaris and was at least able to secure the five bonus points for winning the power stage at the end, but his lead in the WRC was still reduced to 74 points.
Hyundai driver Oliver Solberg struck back after his accident retirement in Finland and recorded his best career result in the WRC with fourth place. The 20-year-old showed a level-headed drive on the tricky 20 stages that caused problems for most Rally1 contenders.
We are back in the service park and most importantly both Jonne and I are OK
There was these two corners: second one of them we just had a bit too optimistic note for it. I had the corner as short and went too early in, couldn’t make the corner and slid into the ditch and rolled. pic.twitter.com/k23DMnZmmG– Kalle Rovanperä (@KalleRovanpera) August 19, 2022
Long battled M-Sports Adrien Fourmaux for position until the Frenchman crashed and retired on the penultimate stage. Fourmaux was in fourth place on Friday until a sudden rain shower cost him a minute and a half.
Due to the problems of the competition, he came back to the front, but then he caught a time penalty because he was two minutes late for the start of the 15th stage. But all that was obsolete when he drove into a ditch on Sunday and almost overturned his Ford Puma. He thus threw away the almost certain fifth place.
That was taken by Toyota’s Takamoto Katsuta, who has continued to score points in every rally this season. The Japanese dropped out of the leading group on Friday when a gearbox problem cost him several minutes.
Jos Verstappen with accident on Saturday
The next best Rally1 driver was M-Sport’s Gus Greensmith in 19th place, who lost more than six minutes on stage 10 when he went off the track while lying sixth.
It was the low point of the rally for M-Sport as Craig Breen was also involved in an incident. He went off the track and overturned in a ditch before coming to a halt lying on his roof. For Breen, it was the third accident in a row and resulted in the stage being abandoned.
Feeling really sorry for the team and for our fans who came to cheer us this weekend. Now we will focus on tomorrow’s stages and try to make the best out of it. WRC YpresRally HMSGOfficial pic.twitter.com/mOd3woyS5t
– Thierry Neuville (@thierryneuville) August 20, 2022
The WRC2 classification was won by Stephane Lefebvre ahead of reigning champion Andreas Mikkelsen and Yohan Rossel.
Former Formula 1 driver Jos Verstappen had temporarily led the Masters Cup class on his WRC debut and was even in the top 20 overall until he had an accident on Saturday’s 13th stage. At the finish he was classified in 51st place.