Action continued with the 19.33km of the Góis stage. By running first on the road and cleaning the track surface, Elfyn Evans had been the slowest of all the Rally1 drivers through the opener and the Toyota driver continued to haemorrhage time in SS2. He dropped 11.1 seconds to a flying Ott Tänak and 6.4 seconds to Takamoto Katsuta.
Tänak’s fastest time gave the Estonian the outright lead, as Dani Sordo was second quickest and held second place, a mere half a second behind the former World Champion. Pierre-Louis Loubet was fifth on the stage and slipped to third overall. It was a good start for the M-Sport Ford World Rally Team with two fastest times and a 1-3 in the overall standings.
Adrien Fourmaux had the measure of the early WRC2 runners and moved into a 3.9-second lead over Oliver Solberg. WRC2 entrant Grégoire Munster rolled out of contention three-kilometres into stage one.
Car 11. NEUVILLE/WYDAEGHE
“I took a lot of care of the tyres at the end of the stage we had a vibration on the rear left and I thought
we were delaminating. It is abrasive. We had to be careful of the tyres.”
Car 69. ROVANPERÄ/HALTTUNEN
“This one was much worse to be honest, straight away a bit faster stage we are having understeer, we
are killing the tyres and losing so much time.”
Car 8. TÄNAK/JÄRVEOJA
“It is a demanding stage especially at the end with the corners and the bedrock. I was struggling a bit with
the rhythm and water leaking on to the windscreen and the dust was sticking..”
Car 33. EVANS/MARTIN
“I’m not sure it’s completely related to opening the road. It’s not working like it should do either..”
Car 6. SORDO/CARRERA
“It was good. A little bit dirty in some places and slippery. I don’t know how are my tyres.”
Car 4. LAPPI/FERM
“All good. I don’t think it got any better.”
Car 7. LOUBET/LANDAIS
“I was too careful at the beginning.”
Car 20. GREENSMITH/ANDERSSON
Had a slide in the stage. Dropped 12 seconds to Mikkelsen. “I genuinely feel like I have no grip. Can’t get
the braking right or the apex right. I tried to be clean towards the end.”
Car 21. SOLBERG/EDMONDSON
“Very dusty in the car, crazy amount of dust. Tyres, much rougher than I thought. I had very bad soft
tyres. We see how the time is. I think we lost a lot of time. I am happy with the driving but it is so loose.”
Car 22. GRYAZIN/ALEKSANDROV
“Still a lot of sand on some places. The stage is difficult. The middle part was not easy.”
Car 23. SUNINEN/MARKKULA
“Feeling is okay. It’s warm and dusty.”
Car 24. MIKKELSEN/ERIKSEN
“Very nice to be back in the car. First stage was difficult with all the dust and we were on the safe side. I
also expect a bit of cleaning for the WRC2 guys. It’s all about getting through the first day with no issues.”
Car 25. FOURMAUX/CORIA
“We are really happy about our pace this morning. The car is working well. We made a different tyre
choice to the others and we will see if it works.”
Car 26. ROSSEL/DUNAND
“My feeling is not bad. I tried to do no mistakes. It is not easy with the tyres but it is the same for all. We
will see.”
Car 28. MUNSTER/LOUKA
Rolled after 3km of SS1. Crew uninjured.