Estonian Ott Tänak crushed the competition on Saturday during the second day of the Chile Rally, the 11th round of 13 in the WRC world championship, relegating his closest pursuer to almost 48 seconds.

At the wheel of his M-Sport/Ford, he won two stages out of four on Saturday with two still to go before the end of the day. He had already won three the day before. His closest pursuer, the Finn Teemu Suninen (Hyundai), who was not expected at such a celebration, was relegated to 41.7 seconds and the 3rd, the Belgian Thierry Neuville, another Hyundai driver, to 53.4 seconds. Behind, the two most serious contenders for the title, the Finnish Kalle Rovanperä and the British Elfyn Evans (Toyota), played it safe.

Rovanperä currently has a 33-point lead over Evans in the provisional championship standings with a total of 90 points remaining in the final three rounds of the championship, including Chile. The Finn, reigning world champion, could also be crowned on Sunday if he wins the event and if the Welshman does not score more than 3 points.

However, such a scenario seemed very unlikely on Saturday with Evans 1 min 04 sec behind the leader and Rovanperä 1 min 30 sec. The latter, however, managed to win two special stages, the 7th and 10th, on Saturday.

The Chilean dirt roads are very rough and tricky, as demonstrated on the first day of the rally on Friday by the abandonment of the Finnish Esapekka Lappi (Hyundai) and the Frenchman Pierre-Louis Loubet (M-Sport/Ford). There are also numerous punctures, like the one that affected Thierry Neuville on Saturday, causing him to lose precious minutes. On Sunday, the competitors will still have to compete in four special stages, the last of which, the Power Stage, allows the top five to score additional points in the championship.