Elfyn Evans claimed the Rally Sweden lead to head a Toyota 1-2-3 as overnight frontrunner Oliver Solberg dropped to fifth following a dramatic Friday morning.
After three snow stages, Evans headed to the midday service with a 14.5s lead over Toyota’s Takamoto Katsuta, with team-mate Sami Pajari in third [+23.3s]. The top five was completed by the returning Esapekka Lappi [+34.9s], who led the Hyundai charge, ahead of Solberg, who recovered from a wild moment to fifth [+36.3s].
Solberg started the morning holding a 3.8s lead over Evans after winning Thursday night’s super special, but was overhauled by Evans in the day’s opening test. Solberg lost time to a brief stall that dropped the early championship leader 5.6s behind stage winner Evans.
The gap increased after stage three when Solberg lost control of his Toyota GR Yaris and ploughed into a snowbank. Somehow, he managed to escape but picked up a front left puncture in the ditch and then suffered another moment as the Swede dropped 31.9s and plummeted to sixth overall.
“I went off the road, there was so much snow everywhere. I had a big snap from the rear and went off. Luckily, I got out. I got a puncture in the ditch, not good,” said Solberg.
Evans claimed his second stage win of the event to date, posting a time five seconds faster than Katsuta to move into an 11.5s lead over his Japanese team-mate.
The Welshman managed to extend his lead to 14.5s after the 11.53km blast through the Back stage, but the test belonged to Solberg, who managed to beat Evans by 1.2s. The effort was enough to haul Solberg up to fifth overall, 0.1s ahead of Hyundai’s Adrien Fourmaux.
Oliver Solberg, Elliott Edmondson, Toyota Gazoo Racing WRT Toyota GR Yaris Rally1
Photo by: Toyota Racing
The timesheets were largely dominated by Toyota with Katsuta and Pajari among the few to pass through the stages unscathed. Katsuta’s road position is likely to help him in the afternoon’s second pass, and he declared that the “next loop will be ours” at the end of stage four.
Pajari could also benefit from his road position too, but the Finn wasn’t overly happy with his morning performance, which he felt was too conservative.
It proved to be a difficult morning for Hyundai with all three of its drivers struggling for different reasons. Lappi fared the best of the trio in fourth overall, in what is his first WRC event since Chile 2024. But the Finn admitted he was struggling for grip.
“It has been a struggle. The car is handling well, it is not about that. I like the balance and how it behaves but we can’t go forward. I’m not getting speed where we would like to. Let’s see if we can do something in the service,” said Lappi.
Fourmaux and Thierry Neuville were clearly frustrated with their Hyundais, with the former admitting he was doing the best with what he has underneath him on his way to sixth overall. Meanwhile, his 2024 world champion team-mate Neuville continued to struggle for confidence, which showed on the timesheets. An off into a snowbank in stage three cost the Belgian more than a minute as he was forced to stop again to clear a misted windscreen.
“I’m really fighting the balance still and it is not a surprise. It is disturbing and makes it very challenging,” said Neuville, who ended the morning 1m37.4s behind in seventh overall.
M-Sport Ford suffered a disastrous start that can be largely blamed on a tyre pressure misjudgement. All three M-Sport Ford Pumas driven by Jon Armstrong, Josh McErlean and Martins Sesks suffered punctures.
Joshua Mcerlean, Eoin Treacy, M-Sport Ford World Rally Team Ford Puma Rally1
Photo by: M-Sport
Sesks picked up a double front puncture in stage two that cost the Latvian seven minutes, before suffering a third puncture in stage three. Sesks had to re-fit one of his damaged tyres to limp through the final stage of the loop.
McErlean suffered a double rear puncture going over a compression in stage three, while Armstrong suffered a front left puncture in stage two. Armstrong completed the loop as the top M-Sport runner in eighth, 47.6s ahead of McErlean.
“What you see on the TV is that it’s only really our cars that are having this problem, so I think we have to investigate that,” said M-Sport team principal Richard Millener.
“Obviously, we did a lot of work on tyre pressures and set-ups on the test and we had a good, reliable set-up that we brought into the rally, but something is obviously different here, whether the road conditions are different or the speed.
“The compressions quite possibly are causing problems, but it seems that I think we have to own up and honestly say that we may well have made a bit of an error here in what we’ve been doing and it’s cost us dearly this morning, which is a real shame.”
Toyota privateer Lorenzo Bertelli also suffered a tyre delamination in stage two that damaged his brake line, forcing the Italian to limp through the remaining stages.
Four stages await the crews to conclude Friday’s action.
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– The Autosport.com Team
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