The morning of the third day of this year’s Vodafone Rally de Portugal saw reigning champion Sebastien Ogier reassert his dominance on the event, with a pair of stage wins for the Frenchman and a close second-fastest time to team-mate Jari-Matti Latvala.
The main story of the morning was tyre choice, with a variety of options being made, from all hards to all softs and everything in between.
The first of the three stages was a relatively straightforward affair, with Ogier taking the win by just 0.2 seconds from leader Mikko Hirvonen and only 0.9s ahead of second-placed Ott Tanak. However, it was the second stage where he made his move.
He maintained his soft tyres over the start of the longest stage of the rally, which was dry to begin with, but then increased his pace on the second, wetter and muddier section to pull away from the competition. By the end of the stage, he was fastest by a margin of 8.7s over Hirvonen and 12.9s in front of Tanak.
The performance elevated him from third to first, ahead of Hirvonen and Tanak, with Ostberg in fourth. One casualty of the stage was Robert Kubica, who again went off the road and got stuck, unable to get back on hence, retired.
The final stage of the morning was shown live on Portuguese TV and it was Latvala, running second on the road, who took the win, 1.9 seconds faster than Ogier who was second. However, with the Finn’s penalties from his retirement on the previous day, this did little to help his cause.
There was drama unfolding however, with Ott Tanak reportedly going off the road in the same place as Latvala did in 2009. Several following cars, including Hirvonen, were held up and completed the stage under yellow flag conditions. Notional times will be issued by the organisers following the second pass of the stage this afternoon.
In WRC2, Jari Ketomaa and Nasser Al-Attiyah maintained their battle from yesterday over the first two stages, with Ketomaa claiming two wins to extend his lead to a slender 17.4s. However, while Ketomaa completed the third stage under yellow flag conditions, Al-Attiyah apparently failed to see the yellow flags and continued at full speed.
In the Junior WRC, Alastair Fisher continued his march at the front of the field, claiming the win on all three stages to reach the midday service with a 1m7s lead in the category. Overnight second-placed Martin Koci lost his brakes on the second stage of the day and dropped back, promoting Simone Campedelli to second with Stephane Lefebvre in third.