Estonian Ott Tänak (M-Sport/Ford) took the lead in the Chile rally, 11th round of 13 of the WRC world championship, at the end of the first day on Friday, Finnish Kalle Rovanperä (Toyota ) preferring to assure him that he is playing for the world title.
At the end of the first six specials, Tänak preceded the unexpected Finn Teemu Suninen (Hyundai) by 4.2 seconds and the Briton Elfyn Evans (Toyota) by 12.7 seconds. Rovanperä was in 5th place, already 38.7 seconds behind the leader. However, it was Evans who had taken charge of operations earlier in the day when he had little other option than to win in an attempt to get closer to the Finn, reigning world champion, in the championship standings. .
Rovanperä currently has a 33-point lead over Evans with a total of 90 points remaining in the final three rounds of the championship, including Chile. The Finn could also be crowned on Sunday if he wins the event and the Welshman does not score more than 3 points. But, as leader of the championship, “Kalle” had to open the road on Friday on the Chilean dirt tracks on which he admitted not being able to find any grip. “We wander everywhere and I can’t find a trajectory,” he confided at the finish of the 6th special.
The Chile rally quickly claimed its first victim in the person of another Finn, Esapekka Lappi (Hyundai), who crashed into an impressive series of rollovers less than 20 kilometers after the start. He and his teammate Janne Ferm escaped unscathed but their car was destroyed. “I braked too late and couldn’t get into the corner. The car’s roll bar is damaged so there is no chance of continuing, said a disgruntled Lappi. Another victim of this first day, the Frenchman Pierre-Louis Loubet (M-Sport/Ford), went off the road during the 3rd special and who was also unable to restart.
The Chile Rally, the only South American round of the season, returns to the WRC calendar after four years of absence. The last winner was Ott Tänak in 2019, the year which saw him win the title. Frenchman Sébastien Ogier, eight-time world champion and winner of three of the six rallies in which he participated this season with Toyota, is not taking part in all of the championship events and is skipping Chile.
The Belgian Thierry Neuville (Hyundai), who lost almost any chance of a title after his retirement from the previous rally in Greece – won by Rovanperä – was in 4th place on Friday, 27.7 seconds behind Tänak. Six stages will be contested on Saturday and four more on Sunday, the last of which, the Power Stage, allows the first 5 to score additional points in the championship.