After Friday’s practice and qualifying on Saturday, it was Lorenzo Baldassarri who was the favourite to take victory in the fourth round of the 2018 Moto2 World Championship, at the Spanish Grand Prix from Jerez.
But it was Alex Marquez who made it to turn one first, and took the initial lead as he looked to take his first win of the season at his home round. But it was not long before Lorenzo Baldassarri claimed the lead for himself, and from there on it was a question of tyres. With Miguel Oliveira making a stunning comeback from fourteenth on the grid, it soon became an opportunity to see whether KTM still held their advantage over Kalex in tyre consumption, and considering the prowess of the Pons HP40 team in setting a bike up to save its tyres, it was sure to be an intriguing battle.
Miguel Oliveira ahead of Alex Marquez – image courtesy of KTM media
Oliveira was able to get close to Balda on many occasions, but in the final eight to ten laps, the Italian just slowly stretched the gap on the Portuguese with sublime consistency and outstanding pace, to finally take victory after over 18 months since his first win at home in Misano. The win for Lorenzo was an important one, for him and the team. Pons HP40 had not won since Alex Rins went to Ecstar Suzuki in MotoGP for the 2017 season, and suffered last year with their rider pairing of Fabio Quartararo and Edgar Pons. Even this year, not many people expected them to challenge with Baldassarri or his teammate Hector Barbera, and if people did expect them to challenge, they expected it to be Barbera at the front and not Balda. But, ultimately, they are a championship winning team, and they belong at the front, and that is precisely where Baldassarri has taken them. Equally, Baldassarri had a difficult 2017, and failed to make the podium as he, along with then teammate Luca Marini and their VR46 management, conflicted with the Forward Racing team for whom they rode. Sito Pons took a big gamble to take on Baldassarri for this year, and thankfully for the pair of them it seems to be paying off, Baldassarri sits just nine points off the championship leader, his flatmate Pecco Bagnaia, and looks as though he may be able to challenge for this championship.
Miguel Oliveira on the podium with Lorenzo Baldassarri. Image courtesy of KTM Media
Miguel Oliveira’s ride was stunning. In five laps he had gone from fourteenth to six and a few minutes later he was second and chasing down Baldassarri for the lead. It is entirely possible that the fight through the pack took too much life out of the rear Dunlop on the KTM, and that that is why Miguel failed to sustain his victory challenge. Aki Ajo said on the grid that Oliveira was back for Sunday, implying that the Portuguese had had an ‘off day’ on Saturday, hence his poor qualifying position. Either way, the points taken by Oliveira on Sunday were crucial for his championship.
They were even more important considering he took points out of his deficit to two-time race winner this season, Pecco Bagnaia, who started and finished third. The Italian struggled to keep the pace of Baldassarri all weekend, as did most, but did well to take a podium, his third of the season. It is true that he would have missed the podium without the mid-race crash of Alex Marquez at turn two, but mistakes are what win and lose championships – it is not the fault of Bagnaia that Marquez made the mistake. Moreover, the number 42 will be content knowing that next up is Le Mans, and he showed great pace at the French circuit last season, whilst the KTMs struggled.
It was not a comfortable podium for the championship leader, though – he was pushed all the way by Xavi Vierge on the Dynavolt Intact GP Kalex, as he continued his solid form of late, and Mattia Pasini rounded out the top five. Paso seemed like he could have had the pace for the podium had his qualifying been better, as he was matching the pace of Vierge and Bagnaia at the end, but was just too far back to make it matter.
Brad Binder had a difficult race in sixth. The South African looked good at the start and seemed as though he could challenge for the victory, especially if the KTM was going to keep good life in its tyres until the end of the race, but after five or six laps he started to drop back and looked very loose on the rear. It was a shame for Binder because for the first time this season he had qualified at the front and was in a position to challenge, but for whatever reason it never happened. The positive for Binder is that he proved that he can have the pace, and surely his first Moto2 victory is not far away.
Marcel Schrotter made a good comeback in the race from 20th on the grid after a three-place grid penalty to finish seventh and ahead of the winner of the 2016 edition of this race, Sam Lowes, by half a second. Ninth place went to Iker Lecuona, who was another rider to make a decent comeback in the race after starting eighteenth, and Fabio Quartararo rounded out the top ten.
Joan Mir, undoubtedly held back by his stomach bug from Saturday, finished eleventh, ahead of Simone Corsi, a somewhat impressive Tetsuta Nagashima in thirteenth, Hector Barbera and Andrea Locatelli who took the last point in fifteenth.
Sixteenth place was taken by Bo Bendsneyder, ahead of 17th placed Jorge Navarro who was recovering from lap one after he was taken out by Luca Marini at Dry Sack. It looked like Marini had out-braked himself and dived to the inside to avoid Sam Lowes directly in front of him, but could do nothing to avoid cleaning out Navarro. Marini should have gone to the outside to avoid Lowes, really, like Andrea Iannone should have done in Barcelona with Jorge Lorenzo in 2016, but things are a lot easier in hindsight. Khairul Idham Pawi took eighteenth place, in front of Isaac Vinales, Lukas Tulovic, Federico Fuligni, Xavi Cardelus who tested the MotoGP Avintia Ducati on Monday and was frighteningly slow, Hector Garzo and Jules Danilo who crashed early in the race but got back on to finish one lap down in 24th and last place.
There were quite a few retirements, perhaps owing a large part to the lack of grip in the searing Spanish heat. Marini was the first to go after his collision with Navarro, then Eric Granado went on lap three, Romano Fenati on lap seven, Stefano Manzi on lap nine, Zulfahmi Kharrudin (who has since been sacked) on lap ten, Danny Kent went with thirteen to go, the same lap as Alex Marquez crashed out of podium contention; Joe Roberts fell with just five laps to go and Steven Odendaal with two.
The dominance in this race from Baldassarri surely puts him into the frame for a championship challenge, especially with the miniscule gap that currently separates him from Bagnaia. Le Mans is next up, where last year the KTMs struggled, so there could be an opportunity in a couple of weeks for the Kalex riders to make a big difference in the championship, and it is not an opportunity that they can pass up if it arrives.
03/03/2018 has been an unsurprising day in the world of MotoGP: Johann Zarco has signed for Red Bull KTM for two years. This news comes one day after Pol Espargaro was confirmed to stay with the Austrian manufacturer for the next two years.
On the face of it, the move is a good one for both sides. Last year, KTM showed a tremendous development rate, as they accelerated through the midfield, whist Zarco has proven since he came to MotoGP at the beginning of last year that he has the potential, if given the right equipment, to fight for the world title, which ultimately is a goal he shares with KTM.
Zarco, Valencia Moto2 2016 – image courtesy of KTM.
Perhaps, though, the move is a better one for the employer than the employee. KTM get a double Moto2 World Champion, 2017’s MotoGP Rookie of the Year and one of the smoothest, yet most aggressive riders on the grid. But what is perhaps more valuable than all of that to KTM is that Zarco is the first ever Red Bull Rookies Cup Champion, a title he won back in 2008. One of KTM’s goals when it entered MotoGP was to obtain a better retention rate of their Red Bull Rookies graduates, as an alarming amount, such as Jorge Martin, Fabio Di Giannantonio and Ayumu Sasaki had ended up on Hondas in Moto3. Zarco moving back to KTM represents an opportunity for KTM to prove to their young riders that staying with KTM is an option – that you don’t have to be on a Honda, Yamaha, Ducati or Suzuki to win in MotoGP.
KTM at work. Image courtesy of RedBull Content Pool
So, whilst KTM get their original road racing golden child, what does Zarco get? Well, he gets a team assembled, in part, of the minds that powered KTM to three of the first five Moto3 World Championships and, in part, of some of the people who developed the MotoGP projects of some of KTM’s rivals. In addition, he gets an RC16. What exactly an RC16 actually is, is difficult to determine, because it changes configuration almost every half-hour. But, for certain, it was the most improved bike of last year, as well as probably the most disappointing bike of 2018.
Bradley Smith and Pol Espargaro at the 2018 RedBull KTM launch. Image Courtesy of Redbull Content Pool
Of course, KTM aren’t sprouting a fifth RC16 for 2019 for Zarco to pilot, they are sacking Bradley Smith. This is not a surprise. Smith did well to avoid being replaced by Mika Kallio for this season, and it was pretty much inevitable that he would not be riding a factory KTM in 2019. His options aren’t endless, either. He might be able to get himself a seat at Tech3 on one of their KTMs, but Avintia will likely keep hold of Rabat to partner Simeon, Marc VDS will remain with Morbidelli and bring in Alex Marquez or Joan Mir to go alongside the Italian, Angel Nieto will probably keep what they have (but may switch bikes) and Aprilia would probably prefer Iannone or a Moto2 rider to replace Aleix Espargaro or Scott Redding (or both), if it came to that, which is somewhat unlikely. It seems Smith’s MotoGP career is done.
Finally, since the other option for Zarco other than KTM was Repsol Honda, the Frenchman’s move to KTM almost confirms Dani Pedrosa’s safety on the second Repsol Honda.
The last race before the all-important Indy 500 had a lot more drama than anyone was expecting after last year! There were incidents for Simon Pagenaud and Josef Newgarden, amongst others, and late cautions altered the order but, ultimately, it was Will Power who triumphed over the rest to finally take his first victory of 2018 after a horrendous run of luck.
Power drove an almost faultless race to take Penske’s 200th win as a team and his first since Pocono last year. After taking pole by the smallest of margins over Robert Wickens, Power led off the initial start and then again off the restart after the first caution, brought out by Pagenaud and Jordan King coming together. He proceeded to build himself a lead over the remainder of the stint however, he then had to switch onto the less favourable Black Firestones, allowing Wickens, on the faster Reds, to pass and extend a lead of his own. Power came out behind Wickens after the second stops but it was only a matter of time before he sailed past him after the compounds had been swapped. Despite the late caution and an unexpected charge from Scott Dixon, Power held out to take his third win at the Indy GP.
Wickens was arguably one of the strongest forces in the race but he struggled more than most on the Blacks in the second stint, dropping him back into the clutches of Alexander Rossi. The third instalment of the Wickens/Rossi battle was somewhat hairier than the second but they, just about, managed to keep it clean after spending the majority of Lap 67 side-by-side. Rossi seemed to only have one challenge and, after that was unsuccessful, he slowly dropped away from Wickens, eventually being caught and passed by Sebastien Bourdais.
In front of that battle was Dixon who, after starting way down in 18th, made an excellent recovery to finish in second. Despite the headline finish, Dixon made a less than great start, finding himself further down in 21st just under one quarter of the way into the race. The #9 Chip Ganassi managed to stay under the radar for the majority of the race, just quietly making progress and, after some very clever strategy, appearing in third at the final restart. Wickens in front was still struggling for pace, despite being back on the Reds, so Dixon was in prime position to take advantage, passing the Schmidt Peterson driver for second at nearly the first opportunity. This weekend could’ve been dire for Dixon but, with that recovery, he now sits in fourth in the championship.
Bourdais was another one to stay out of too much drama in the race with his only incident coming as a result of a more than optimistic lunge from Newgarden. After initially passing Wickens, the positions were soon reversed on the restart with Bourdais then dropping back to the cars behind. Bourdais struggled on the Blacks in the second stint meaning that a frustrated and faster Newgarden was closing in on him. After waiting for all of a lap after catching Bourdais, Newgarden went for a gap that was never really there on the inside of Bourdais. The #1 Penske driver subsequently clipped the kerb and spun, narrowly missing Bourdais but wrecking his own race. It was an uncharacteristic moment from Newgarden that’s cut his championship lead down to just two points over Rossi.
Some of the biggest news coming into the weekend was the return of the very successful and much-loved Penske driver of Helio Castroneves. Despite being a catalyst of sorts in the Pagenaud/King incident, Castroneves ran an otherwise clean and confidence boosting race. While it was not the win or podium that he’d potentially dreamt of, a solid sixth place finish in one of the most competitive fields in motorsport is nothing to be ashamed of. This race, however, was never the focus for Castroneves who is targeting a fourth Indy 500 win in a few weekends time.
The most unfortunate driver of the race was, once again, Pagenaud who was caught up in an incident which, through no fault of his own, compromised the rest of his race, eventually coming home in eight. Pagenaud was running alongside Castroneves going into Turn 1 and was moved aside by his returnee teammate. This put Pagenaud into the path of King who was then going too fast to avoid hitting the back of Pagenaud’s Penske, putting King in the gravel and dropping Pagenaud down to the back of the field. It was deemed as a racing incident so no penalties were dished out but the other incident on the first lap, between Spencer Pigot and Takuma Sato, did warrant a penalty. Pigot was running alongside Sato when the former got onto the kerb, taking flight and then T-boning the side of Sato. Pigot took the blame for the collision and was handed a drive-thru penalty which dropped him way down the order.
Next up for IndyCar is the Indy 500 for which practice commences on the 15th May before qualifying starts on the 20th. The race itself isn’t until the 27th so there’s a lot of build-up to go until then!
This weekend, the Superbike World Championship heads to Imola in Italy, for the fifth round of the 2018 championship. Tom Sykes comes into this round on the crest of a wave after his victory in Asses two weeks ago, but it is his teammate, Jonathan Rea, who leads the championship.
But Sykes’ victory in Assen showed that this season will not be as easy for Rea as the previous ones, as it was the first time Rea had been beaten at the Dutch circuit since he joined Kawasaki back at the end of 2014. And Imola is a strong circuit for the 2013 World Champion, too, and one where he has strong support from the Italian fans – who can forget Sykes’ rage-fuelled pole lap in 2014 on race tyres when his initial lap on a qualifying tyre was disallowed because he crossed the line after a red flag was thrown. In addition to that, he scored a double win in Imola back in 2013, which proved critical for the title race as his championship rival, Sylvain Guintoli, retired from the first race. If Sykes can keep hold of his tyres this weekend, a traditional weakness of the number 66 but one he seemed to be able to remedy at an unusually warm Assen, he could be difficult to beat.
But if anyone could do so, it would likely be his teammate, Jonathan Rea. The Northern Irishman won both Imola races in 2014 on the underpowered Pata Honda. However, Rea hasn’t won at the San Marinese circuit since 2015, when he also did the double. Despite a test at Brno, on the way into this weekend Rea has claimed that he is still missing something to take the maximum from the 2018 ZX10-RR. But, like when Marc Marquez said the same thing about his Honda RC213V after last weekend’s Spanish Grand Prix at Jerez, it is difficult to take this statement from Rea as one which perhaps put him under threat. If anything, it just serves as a worry to his fellow competitors, and there is no doubt that the reigning champion will be in the fight for the victory this weekend.
Chaz Davis. Image courtesy of Ducati.com
However, Imola is Ducati’s home, near to their Borgo Panigale base, and they will be eager to bounce back after a difficult weekend in Assen where they scored only one podium. Chaz Davies, though, has won the last four races at Imola, doing the double in the last two years on the #7 bike, and it will be important for the Welshman to do the same this weekend to maintain his championship challenge – his fifth place in Assen race two did not help his situation.
It was the other factory Ducati rider, Marco Melandri, though, who made the big progress at the Brno test. The Italian has suffered with straight-line instability all season, and it didn’t get any better in Holland, despite the outward appearance seeming significantly improved. The Italian will be hopeful of repeating his Phillip Island performance from February this weekend at his home race, although he has not won in Imola since he won the 125cc Grand Prix there in 1999.
The Yamaha riders had contrasting fortunes in Assen. Alex Lowes took pole, but his weekend got significantly worse from there, with the wrong front tyre being fitted to the bike (his second bike) for race one, and then, after starting from tenth due to his poor race one result, he crashed out of sixth place in race two, although he remounted to take 2 points for fourteenth. The 2013 British Superbike Champion will be hoping for better luck in the races this weekend and that, combined with recent improvements on the part of the bike, could get him back on the podium this weekend.
It was an almost opposite weekend for the #60 Yamaha of Michael van der Mark. The Assen home hero had a difficult qualifying, ending up seventh, but took second in race one and third in race two, challenging Rea on both occasions. Although, van der Mark has never been on the podium in Italy. He should have won race two in Misano last year, but his tyre failed causing him to crash – he will be hoping to correct that this weekend, although in the past Imola has proven a tricky circuit for Yamaha – they haven’t scored a top five since their return in 2015.
Jake Gagne. Image Courtesy of Hondanews.eu.
Honda have a difficult situation. Whilst Jake Gagne is fit for the whole weekend after missing days two and three of Assen, Leon Camier has only been given clearance for FP1 on Friday morning. It is good to have the pair of them back after there were no Ten Kate Hondas on the grid at their home race, but Camier will only decide if he will ride after the first session once it is completed. If Camier should decide to not continue with the weekend, BSB’s Jason O’Halloran, who took the Honda Racing CBR1000RR SP2 Fireblade to second place at Oulton Park last weekend in the British championship, is ready to take over for the weekend.
Eugene Laverty is back too, after he missed Aragon and Assen due to the injuries he sustained in Thailand when he was hit by Jordi Torres’ MV Agusta after he crashed the Milwaukee Yamaha. The Northern Irishman is back one round ahead of his plan, so it will be interesting to see his competitiveness – hopefully he will be okay to make the weekend with a good pace, and maybe he can make two good results in the races on Saturday and Sunday.
Leon Haslam is back in World Superbike, too, after his three successive wins in BSB, including a double win last weekend at Oulton Park which fired him to the top of the general standings. Haslam will be riding a retro Elf livery on the Puccetti Kawasaki, one similar to that his dad, Ron, used to ride, albeit on a Honda. Haslam, of course, took a podium in race one at Donington last year when he finished second, behind Tom Sykes who won thanks to Jonathan Rea’s tyre failure. Whether Haslam can replicate that result this weekend, on a track which he has not ridden since 2015, when he struggled a bit on the Aprilia, remains to be seen. And, of course, the Kawasaki in World Superbike is significantly different both to the one he rides in BSB, and that which he rode last year at Donington – most notably the maximum rev drop that Kawasaki has been suffering with so far this season will be a factor in Imola.
2017 FIA World Rally Championship Round 07, Rally Italia Sardegna 05-11 June 2017 Day 1 Portrait Thierry Neuville Photographer: Helena El Mokni Worldwide copyright: Hyundai Motorsport GmbH
Thierry gives his thoughts after five rounds of this year’s world rally championship. After three podium finishes including a win in round two in the snow-covered stages of Sweden, he’s now just ten points away from championship leader Seb Ogier with Rally Portugal next week.
2018 FIA World Rally Championship Round 05, Rally Argentina 26-29 April 2018 Photographer: Helena El Mokni Worldwide copyright: Hyundai Motorsport GmbH
Warren Nel
Thinking about Day one of Rally Argentina, how hard is it the judge the pace to drive at when you’re second on the road?
Thierry Neuville
Its not more hard than before, but you know that due to the road cleaning you are losing time, but that’s part of the game so you try your best you have to take some times a bit more risk, but the Friday is the most important day because it influences your road position for the upcoming days so you have to give it everything.
WN – Day two of Rally Argentina saw some foggy stages. Can you give an idea how hard it is to drive fast when faced with this?
TN – Really tricky, especially when there were no trees- was really really tricky, but had to say I had good pace notes, I was confident, I was decided to make a difference in that stage, to try to make a gap with Kris Meeke, and I was able to do it, kept Dani Sordo behind, Ott Tanak was on the same speed as us, but we have done pretty well.
WN – Sunday saw you win the power stage and score another podium this year. When we spoke at the Autosport Show in January you said you were aiming for a consistent approach to the results throughout the year. Would you say that was working so far?
TN – Of course, it’s working so far, no real big mistake, good points couple of podiums, a win so I’m satisfied, there were only some issues we had in Mexico which made us lose some points, but other that this we are really consistent, we never gave up, even in difficult conditions and scenarios like in Mexico with the powersteering and the fuel problem, but we kept it going and were still able to score important points.
WN – Leading the championship heading into Rally Mexico meant that you opened the road on day one. How did you approach the creation of the stage notes taking this into account?
TN – No different approach, you just need to be mentally prepared, you won’t be the fastest, it’s not possible, but still we were driving well, obviously we got some issues, but yeah, my approach is the same, try to do your best, make no mistakes, and obviously so far always try to keep Ogier behind.
WN – With eight rounds of this year’s championship left you’re ten points behind Seb and Ott is now third. Do you think the championship fight will just be between you three, or will someone else join the fight?
TN – Ah yes, I think so. We are three drivers, we are clearly always fighting for podium positions. Yep, it’s going to be between us. Maybe Mikkelsen can join at some point as well. But for sure the wins in upcoming events that won’t be us, we have Hayden joining with a very good road position, Kris Meeke, Jari-Matti Latvala, who are quite far in the standings as well, Lappi a bit behind, so all those guys going to fight for wins on the next events so we going to try to survive with our road position and try to make podium out of it.
2018 FIA World Rally Championship Round 02, Rally Sweden 15-18 February 2018 Thierry Neuville, Nicolas Gilsoul, Hyundai i20 Coupe WRC Photographer: Austral Worldwide copyright: Hyundai Motorsport GmbH
A big thank you to Thierry for answering my questions. Also, a big thank you to the PR of Hyundai Motorsport, Nicolette Russo for sending these to Thierry, and finally our own PR, Julia for setting up the interview.
IndyCar is back from its quick breather, meaning the Month of May can start in earnest. We’ve already had the Rookies and Refreshers test along with the first open test, both in preparation for the Indy 500 but before that gets underway, IndyCar go racing at the road course for the Indy GP.
IndyCar were at Barber Motorsports Park last time out with the rain-hit and eventually rescheduled race being won by the championship leader, Josef Newgarden. Newgarden started from pole, in both attempts at the race, and led the vast majority of the laps to take his second win of his title defence. Ryan Hunter-Reay followed the #1 Penske of Newgarden home to be lead Andretti for the first time this season. In fact, that was the first time that Alexander Rossi wasn’t the first Andretti home, with the American finishing down in eleventh. Elsewhere, the Schmidt Peterson duo of James Hinchcliffe and Robert Wickens finished third and fourth respectively, showing that both have championship potential.
While it was a Chevrolet winner, Honda were, once more, the stronger of the two with Honda locking out positions two through to eight. That performance, and those of the previous three races, has left Honda with a 67-point lead over Chevrolet in the Manufactures Standings.
Last year, the Indy GP was won by the so-far unbelievably unlucky Will Power who was one of only two leaders of the race, Helio Castroneves being the other. Scott Dixon followed Power home in second from Hunter-Reay and the other thus-far unfortunate Penske of Simon Pagenaud. It was a fairly clean and, for IndyCar’s standards, uneventful race last year with the only two retirements coming from mechanical issues for Sebastien Bourdais and Charlie Kimball.
This track has always been a Penske stronghold with the only non-Penske win coming back at the track’s inaugural race in 2014 where Pagenaud, then with Schmidt Peterson, won. That 2014 win is still Honda’s only triumph at the Indy road course to date, a record they’ll be hoping to set straight this weekend.
As with the previous two races, IndyCar is on another street course so usual qualifying procedure applies with the two groups going into the fastest twelve and then the Firestone Fast Six.
There have been quite a number of driver changes since Barber, some scheduled, some not. Pietro Fittipaldi was down to take the wheel of the #19 Dale Coyne however, after his monster, leg-breaking crash at Raidillon during qualifying for the 6 Hours of Spa, he, quite clearly won’t be racing. Dale Coyne have announced that Zachary Claman De Melo will be in the #19 in his place but they are still looking for a replacement for the Indy 500 and Texas. Kyle Kaiser is taking over the solo Juncos from Rene Binder as planned while Castroneves will make his much-awaited return to IndyCar with Penske, fielding his #3 car once more.
As always, predicting anything for the weekend is rather difficult! Given their form at this track so far, you’d expect Penske to be strong but, after the starts both Power and Pagenaud have had, the safe money would have to be on Newgarden. Equally, you can’t count out any of the Andrettis, nor the Chip Ganassis or the Schmidt Petersons so really, it’s anyone’s guess!
Practice and Qualifying will be streamed on IndyCar’s channels as usual and the race can be found on the BT Sport/ESPN channel. The whole Mazda Road to Indy lot will also be there with all of Indy Lights, Pro Mazda and USF2000 sessions available to stream in the same place as IndyCar.
The IndyCar timings, in BST, for the weekend are as follows:
Friday
Practice 1 – 2:15pm
Practice 2 – 5:30pm
Qualifying – 9:30pm
Well, who else needed the last fortnight to get over Baku? What a race weekend that was!
It amazed me how much action was served up in Azerbaijan, despite the teams experiencing the chaos of the street circuit last year. However, speaking of tracks that should be well known yet still provide the thrills and spills of a newbie; the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya is Formula 1’s next stop.
Final lap, 40+ second lead… what could possibly go wrong?
Although the teams and drivers spend lengthy spells at the home of the Spanish Grand Prix over the winter, as well as of course summer testing and the upcoming race weekend, the 2.8-mile course still offers many difficulties.
If the mixture of high and low-speed corners doesn’t catch you out, or the new track surface, the unpredictable crosswinds probably will; meaning once again it is set to be a challenging three days for the drivers.
The next #F1Esports qualification race gets underway at 20:00 BST! ⏰
Ten drivers. Three Pro Draft slots. One race on @Formula1game ?
Turn 1, in particular, will be an exciting contest – with it one of the few overtaking hotspots, although the latter stages of the circuit are seen as the most tricky – with maximum speed vital yet hard to come by in the final two corners.
The Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya, overall, is known as a place where teams struggle to reach their optimum set-up, with the high tyre wear a significant factor in that.
With that in mind, Pirelli has allocated the medium, soft and supersoft tyres – a softer trio of compounds compared to last year due to the new surface, with the latter making its debut at the Barcelona track.
“This year, Barcelona isn’t exactly like going to a new circuit for the teams: but the changes to the surface are still significant enough to alter some of the track’s fundamental characteristics,” Pirelli’s Head of Car Racing, Mario Isola, told Formula 1’s official website.
“We too have made a change by reducing the tread depth on the slick tyres to reduce the risk of overheating, as we will also do for Paul Ricard and Silverstone, but it’s not a change that any of the drivers will notice in terms of performance or stint length.
“The teams already have some knowledge of the new asphalt from pre-season testing, but the weather is now much warmer, the cars considerably faster and there will also be some ageing of the surface.
“This year, we bring the supersoft to the Spanish Grand Prix – effectively, two steps softer than the softest nomination in 2017, as all the compounds are a step softer anyway – so the homework done in free practice will be particularly important.”
Race one for British Superbikes at Oulton Park got underway in blistering Cheshire heat on what was the hottest early-May bank holiday on record. The heat meant that the soft rear tyre was a must, and for the majority, medium fronts were the order of the day. The heat also meant that grip was at a premium, and there were several crashes early on, with Michael Laverty crashing out on the first lap at Lodge, Glenn Irwin joining him on the side lines not too much later at Island Bend, and many more falling victim to the greasy Oulton asphalt.
But it was Jake Dixon who grabbed the early lead at turn one, and he kept it for most of the race, unchallenged. But, with about five laps to go, Leon Haslam made his move at Lodge corner on the inside and began to stretch away from the RAF Regular and Reserves Kawasaki. The two were out front on their own thanks to a fairly large gap that appeared between the then second-placed Haslam and third-placed Brad Ray, when Irwin hit the deck. After Haslam took the lead away from Dixon, he took minimal amounts of time out of the youngster over the final laps, and eventually won with a gap close to one second. It was Haslam’s second consecutive win, and first dry weather victory of the season – one that catapulted him to second in the championship. A welcome result, then, for Haslam, after struggling in the dry at least with the JG Speedfit Kawasaki in the first two rounds of the season.
The second place of Jake Dixon was an important one too. It had not been a spectacular start to the number 27’s season with results below his expectations in Donington and race one at Brands Indy, and a crash in the second race at round two. This result in a way, marks the proper start of Dixon’s season and it seems the first 2018 victory is not too far away for him. It will be interesting to see whether he can go one better in race two.
Shane Byrne. Image courtesy of ducatiukracing.com
Shane Byrne took third place, after a tough move on Jason O’Halloran at Hizzy’s chicane towards the end of the race. The move allowed him to quickly set his sights on Bradley Ray, who was seemingly struggling with rear grip towards the end. His overtake on Ray was somewhat less on the limit than the one with O’Halloran; clean as you like, in fact, and after that the Suzuki rider had no response, giving Byrne an important podium in the quest for podium points ahead of the Showdown. The podium was not enough for Shakey to hold second in the championship, which went to Haslam, but the 41-year-old is now just seven points off the top of the championship. After the race he complained of chatter, and it will be that which he and his PBM Ducati team will seek to fix for the second race.
Brad Ray came home in fourth. He made a great start from ninth, but got very detached after the crash of Irwin which happened directly in front of him. It looked from quite an early stage as though he was struggling with the rear tyre, but that could just have been him pushing on trying to keep Byrne and O’Halloran behind, whilst catching the leaders. Ultimately, he failed on two out of three counts, and will hope to have a better pace in the second race. Interestingly, Ray was the only Suzuki rider to choose the hard front tyre, everyone else was on the soft front. Whether that could be the difference maker this afternoon remains to be seen, but Ray will be keen to return to the podium to continue to build his tally of those all-important podium points.
O’Halloran took fifth place. After the move Byrne put on him, he became very detached from Shakey and Ray. To compound that, his CBR1000RR Fireblade developed a gearbox issue towards the end of the race. The positive for O’Halloran is that before the incident with Byrne he had a good pace, so he has something to build on for race two.
Josh Brookes took his best dry result of the season so far in sixth place. With that in mind, his claims of progress in the Oulton Park test just over one week ago are valid, but he also clearly still has more work to do to be able to challenge for podiums and victories.
Seventh place went to Danny Buchan on the FS-3 Kawasaki, ahead of Tommy Bridewell’s Halsall Suzuki, Tarran Mackenzie’s McAMS Yamaha and Richard Cooper’s Buildbase Suzuki. Mackenzie’s ride was impressive in just his fifth BSB start, and at a circuit where he has been struggling somewhat through the weekend, and also at the test. There is a lot of potential in Taz Mackenzie on a superbike, and it could be quite frightening when he begins to unlock more of it.
After a first lap excursion at Hizzy’s that dropped him to pretty much the very back of the pack, James Ellison took eleventh place, although he will be eager to improve a lot on that in race two after a difficult start to the season, if he wants to make the Showdown. Ryuichi Kiyonari perhaps surprised a few people with his twelfth-place finish on his BSB return, replacing Dan Linfoot. He was battling for most of the race with Gino Rea (13th) and Jakub Smrz (14th), ahead of Mason Law who took the final point, and his first in BSB.
The first of the non-point-scorers to cross the line was Sylvain Barrier, ahead of Dean Harrison who has had a cracking weekend, Martin Jessopp who would have been in the points but had a big off-track moment towards the end of the race at Cascades, David Johnson, Shaun Winfield and Connor Cummins, who was the 21st and last finisher, on his first outing on the new Fireblade as he prepares for the big road races coming up.
Retirements were aplenty, with Luke Mossey having a fairly large tip off at Druids, Taylor Mackenzie falling at Lodge, Glenn Irwin (aforementioned) crashing out at Island, Carl Phillips going down, Peter Hickman getting away with a high-side at Cascades, Kyle Ryde who made the Craig Fitzpatrick Yamaha a fixture of the local forestry at Druids and finally Michael Laverty (aforementioned) who crashed at the end of lap one.
The track temperature for race two should be somewhat cooler than for the first race of the day, so the casualty count should be smaller in the second outing. But the big question is whether anyone can challenge Leon Haslam, and whether it can be someone other than Jake Dixon.
The Moto3 World Championship race at Jerez was set to take place under gorgeous Spanish sun, on the track bearing the name of Spanish motorcycle racing’s original hero, Angel Nieto. It was expected that Jorge Martin and Fabio Di Giannantonio would dominate proceedings, after showing superior pace over the course of the weekend, but of course all of the Spanish riders were eager to impress and make a good result at the ‘true’ Spanish Grand Prix. The action, like in qualifying, was immediate, as John McPhee torpedoed down the inside of turn two on the first lap, colliding with Lorenzo Dalla Porta, who sat up and hit Dennis Foggia. The three went down and did not continue. McPhee looked fairly unamused with what had happened, and the same can be said for Dalla Porta. All three riders got away okay, and will be looking to get back towards the front end of the field in Le Mans.
In the first few laps, it looked as though there could be a group of eight breaking away at the front, but a mistake from Fabio Di Giannantonio at Dry Sack dropped him through the pack, and he knitted the groups back together, to have an eighteen bike leading group.
Kaito Toba ahead of the pack. Image courtesy of hondaproracing.com
Eventually, there was a split. With about ten laps to go, six riders began to get away at the front, mostly due to the robust defending of Kaito Toba who had fought his way up to seventh in an impressive ride. The Japanese rider was unwilling to let track position go, and the hard battling cost him and the people behind him a lot of time to the leaders.
But, finally, this battle would prove to be the battle for the final podium spot, when Aron Canet lost control of the #44 Estrella Galicia Honda NSF250R into Dry Sack corner, clattered into title rival Jorge Martin, who – unintentionally – ran into Tony Arbolino and Enea Bastianini, meaning the front group of six was now just two.
After the race, Martin said that he became angrier when he realised it was Canet. He implied that his increased anger was fuelled by his compatriot’s incident with Makar Yurchenko in Argentina, which Jorge claimed he believes was an intentional move by Canet. In fairness to Canet, after the race he seemed genuinely remorseful. He wanted to apologise to all the riders involved, but Martin would not let him apologise in person, or at least he would not accept Canet’s apology. This is a shame because it follows the precedent set by Valentino Rossi in Argentina: Marc Marquez went to apologise, but Rossi wouldn’t let him (despite himself going to apologise, famously, after taking out Casey Stoner at Jerez, 2011). In my opinion, Martin is following the example of Rossi, set in Argentina, when he (through Uccio) told Marquez to go away when Marc tried to apologise; this is the wrong example to follow. Martin should be using Rossi’s approach in Jerez 2011, and allowed Canet to apologise, as Stoner did on that occasion – everyone should be allowed the opportunity to apologise.
The incident left him in the lead and Marco Bezzecchi, who was at the back of the front group when the incident happened, out front, but with a one-second-or-more gap between them with four laps to go. Bezzecchi started immediately closing on Oettl, but ultimately was unable to make a pass one the German for the win. So, it was Philipp Oettl who took his first Grand Prix victory ahead of Bezzecchi, the German joining his father in ‘Grand Prix winner’ status. Oettl has taken his time to get there, I remember when he was in the podium fight riding a Kalex KTM in 2013 at Aragon, in a year where, unless you were riding a full KTM, you had no chance. To put it into perspective, in 2013, Oettl’s first year, Marc Marquez was a MotoGP rookie; the BBC were still broadcasting MotoGP; CRT was still a thing; Jonathan Rea was just ‘a very good Honda rider’ and Valentino Rossi was nearing the end of his career. A lot has changed since Oettl came onto the scene, and now it will be interesting to see whether he is able to build on this performance and result going forward into the rest of the 2018 season.
The second place of Marco Bezzecchi was very important, because thanks to the crashes of Martin, Canet and Bastianini, Bez is now the championship leader of the Moto3 World Championship. The media will continue to assert that Bezzcchi has lucked into his championship advantage, along with his podium today, but the fact remains that Bezzecchi is leading the championship and that is only the case, because he deserves to be. Had Martin have chosen a wet tyre in Argentina, he would probably be leading the championship. Will Bezzecchi be leading after Le Mans? Well, we know from last season and from Argentina that he likes the wet conditions, and we also know that Le Mans is not immune to some precipitation, but, realistically, it is only a matter of time before the likes of Canet, Bastianini and especially Martin begin to asset their authority on the championship.
Alonso Lopez. Image courtesy of Hondaproracing
The third-place battle that was left after Canet’s error was a lively one, but an intriguing one. Almost all of the people who looked to be in the running for the final podium spot seemed to be unlikely ones: Jaume Masia, Kaito Toba, Alonso Lopez and Marcos Ramirez were all in there. Di Giannantonio was too, but the former four seemed the more likely. Finally, it was Lopez who crossed the line third. Unfortunately for the Spanish rookie, he was forced to give up a place due to a penalty being applied after the race for exceeding track limits on the final lap. This was pretty heart-breaking for Lopez, in his first ever Spanish Grand Prix, but the penalty meant that the true paddock local boy, Marcos Ramirez, got the podium for the Bester Capital Dubai KTM team – his first of 2018, a year in which he has struggled to get on with the new KTM.
Lopez’ penalty dropped him to fourth place, which is still a stunning result considering that he was at one stage in the gravel on the outside of the Angel Nieto corner. His first Moto 3 podium is surely not far away. Masia came across the line in fifth place, which again was a particularly stunning result considering he qualified down in 25th place. Tatsuki Suzuki took sixth on the SIC58 Squdra Corse, ahead of Di Giannantonio who will be disappointed with seventh place, Jakub Kornfeil in eighth, Toba who ended up ninth and Gabriel Rodrigo who had an anonymous race to round out the top ten.
Niccolo Antonelli looked strong early on, but in the end could only manage eleventh, ahead of Ayumu Sasaki who made good progress from a dismal qualifying, Andrea Migno who would have hoped for more in his team’s home event but after his qualifying penalty which landed him 18th on the grid it was always going to be a difficult task for the Italian. Makar Yurchenko took fourteenth place, and it was the wildcard Ai Ogura who took his first Grand Prix point on debut in fifteenth.
Adam Norrodin came over the line in sixteenth place, ahead of Nicolo Bulega in seventeenth – which in a somewhat saddening way is an improvement for the Italian. Livio Loi was eighteenth, Nakarin Atiratphuvapat nineteenth and Kazuki Masaki was the twentieth and final finisher on the RBA KTM.
There were many retirements. On lap one, the aforementioned waywardness of John McPhee claimed the races of Dalla Porta and Foggia, and Jeremy Alcoba, the second wildcard, got caught up in that incident too. Albert Arenas retired nine laps from the flag, and five laps later Canet cleaned out Martin, Arbolino and Bastianini.
Next, the Moto3 World Championship heads to France, and Le Mans, for round four of the 2018 World Championship, and the championship favourites will be keen to bounce back from their pointless weekends in Jerez.
Young Estonian Ott took his third WRC victory and first for Toyota on his fifth outing for the Finnish based Toyota squad! Here’s the story of how they did it. In the championship fight, Thierry closed the gap on his rival Seb in their fight for the title and Ott Tanak has brought himself into this fight with his brilliant drive to victory.
2018 FIA World Rally Championship / Round 05, Rally Argentina / April 26-19, 2018// Worldwide Copyright: Toyota Gazoo Racing WRC
After the short stage on Thursday evening, Thierry Neuville held a lead over Ott with Seb in third.
Friday would see the crews tackle seven stages, totaling 154.2km. This was the start list – Ogier, Neuville, Tänak, Mikkelsen, Meeke, Lappi, Latvala, Sordo, Breen, Evans, Suninen, Al Qassimi.
Despite being the first car into the stage, Seb won the stage and was eight seconds faster than Thierry who was fourth fastest. Ott was not fast in this one, over twenty seconds slower than the leader and tenth.
It all turned around on the next stage. Ott took the stage and Seb dropped 17.8 seconds. Andreas Mikkelsen moved into the lead with Ott now just nine and a half seconds off the lead. Sadly, this stage saw the exit of Jari-Matti.
Stage four saw Ott close the gap to Andreas to just one second, whilst Kris got past Seb into third overall. Thierry was also moving up on place to fifth overall.
The lead changed again in stage five in the short 6km super special with Ott moving ahead of Andreas. Thierry also dropped a place to Dani.
After the service break, the second run of Las Bajadas – Villa Del Dique saw Ott take another stage victory and increase his lead after Andreas drop right down to eight overall. Kris was now the closest to the young Estonian.
Stage seven saw the lead increase again with Ott now almost 17 seconds ahead of Kris. Dani was second fastest in the stage and this moved him ahead of Seb and Thierry into third overall.
The final stage of the day was won again by Ott with Thierry just a little over one second slower than him in second, meaning that he’d moved ahead also of Dani and into third overall. Kris remained the closest driver to Ott, ending the day 22 seconds away, and wary of the foggy stages that sometimes show up during the morning of day two.
Ott had driven a superbly all day, whilst Kris had done a clever drive. He’d picked up a puncture in the last stage of the day though, leading to the little time loss.
Classification after Day One
1
O. Tänak
M. Järveoja
Toyota Yaris WRC
1:30:38.6
2
K. Meeke
P. Nagle
Citroën C3 WRC
+22.7
3
T. Neuville
N. Gilsoul
Hyundai i20 Coupe WRC
+28.6
4
D. Sordo
C. del Barrio
Hyundai i20 Coupe WRC
+29.5
5
S. Ogier
J. Ingrassia
Ford Fiesta WRC
+36.4
6
C. Breen
S. Martin
Citroën C3 WRC
+41.2
7
A. Mikkelsen
A. Jæger
Hyundai i20 Coupe WRC
+58.5
8
E. Lappi
J. Ferm
Toyota Yaris WRC
+1:07.9
9
E. Evans
D. Barritt
Ford Fiesta WRC
+1:10.3
10
T. Suninen
M. Markkula
Ford Fiesta WRC
+1:33.7
Let’s hear then from the drivers-
Ott Tanak
“I am definitely happy with today. We have been pushing really hard and I couldn’t have done that if it wasn’t for the perfect feeling that I have with the car. It has been performing really well and it’s giving me confidence. It’s good that we have been able to make some improvements and they seem to be paying off, although I think there is still more to come. It’s a shame that we lost some time on the first stage this morning: I’m not sure how it happened but we had a spin in a very narrow place and it took a long time to get back in the right direction. Then we started to push hard to get the time back, and this afternoon we had three perfect stages. I feel quite confident about our position: Tomorrow the stages are even faster and we know that fast roads suit this car really well, and I was able to do some really good times on these stages last year, so I’m looking forward to it.”
Kris Meeke
“Although our day got off to a difficult start, with some visibility issues on the first stage and some problems finding the right pace on the next one, we worked things out after that. This was a daunting leg so we’re pleased to have been both smart and consistent. I felt confident behind the wheel, which just goes to show that the changes made to the car are going the right way and that we have to keep it up. If there is fog tomorrow, then that blows the whole thing wide open again because the gaps will end up being minutes rather than seconds. So it’ll be up to us to perform!”
Thierry Neuville
“I am quite pleased with the day overall. We have had a good feeling inside the car and felt that we could really push for competitive stage times despite starting second on the road. At the same time, we have had to avoid trouble and effectively save the car, as the stages were pretty rough in places. The strategy has really been to take it easy and keep in touch with the leaders. I am sure we have more pace in us for tomorrow, which will be a very different challenge.”
Hyundai Motorsport
Dani Sordo (4th)
“It has been a positive start to the rally for us, and I am thoroughly enjoying driving in front of these crowds. The stages themselves, as we know from the past, are very rough and it is very easy to have some problems. To be fighting for the podium is where we would hope to be at the end of the first day – and it is very close. I have to thank the team for the job they have done to prepare our car. I have hit a few big rocks this afternoon, and the car has done its job perfectly, very solid and competitive. Let’s see if we can keep up the fight tomorrow!”
Andreas Mikkelsen (7th)
“We had a great morning and led the rally for a few stages, which was very promising. Ott has been incredibly fast today so we knew we had to push hard, which is easier said than done on such rough stages. It was going well until the start of the afternoon loop when the tyre came loose from the rim and lost us a lot of time. We then had to be extra careful because we knew one more issue might be game over, so we focused on getting the car home. We’ll be ready for another push on Saturday.”
M-Sport Ford WRT
Sébastien Ogier (5th)
“It was an excellent day for us and I couldn’t do much more in terms of driving. We didn’t make any mistakes and I really tried to push as much as I could. Ott [Tänak] is flying and did a great job, but other than that we’re still in the fight for second place – despite opening the road.”
Sébastien Ogier, Rally Argentina 2018 – Photo Credit, M-Sport Ford
Elfyn Evans (9th)
“For sure it has been a difficult day for us. On the whole I felt that the driving wasn’t particularly bad, but the times just haven’t been there. We need to understand why that is and do better tomorrow.”
Teemu Suninen (10th)
“It hasn’t been the easiest day in the car, but we have learnt a lot. We were able to improve the driving a bit today, but we need to improve more to be faster and challenge for the podium. The main things we need to look at are the braking style and corner entries. Hopefully if we can improve one, it will be like a domino effect and the other will improve too. So, let’s see what we can do tomorrow.”
Toyota Gazoo Racing WRT
Esapekka Lappi (8th)
“This morning started surprisingly well on the first two stages. On the third one we lost a lot of time, as it was a bit more slippery and I didn’t want to make any mistakes. This afternoon it was a lot rougher on the second pass, and to have three punctures today is obviously not good. I’m not really sure why it kept happening, and to be honest I think it was just bad luck: the tyres themselves were fine but they kept coming off the rim. Tomorrow the weather might be different and this could be an opportunity for me to get some time back.”
Jari-Matti Latvala (DNF)
“I had a perfect feeling with the car this morning. The Yaris WRC is going so well here, and it was so easy to drive. I was really enjoying it. The second stage of the day was going really well and actually getting better and better as it went on. Then we came to a long right-hand corner and at the exit of the corner I hit a rock which I didn’t see hidden in the shadows. Immediately the front-right suspension was broken and one of the oil pipes was damaged, so I had to stop. On this rally there are so many rocks: sometimes you are lucky with them and sometimes you are unlucky, and I think I was unlucky. It is very frustrating because we were in such a good rhythm. My co-driver Miikka was really frustrated too, because he knew that I was not attacking too hard. I just need to put this behind me, and hope that I can get that good feeling again on the next rally. One thing is for sure: the car is really fast.”
Citroen Abu Dhabi WRT
Craig Breen (6th)
“It was a pretty good leg for us, given our lack of knowledge of the stages. I think I made a real breakthrough in the afternoon, in trying to adapt my driving style to the handling of the C3 WRC. My time on the final stage shows this and that augurs well for the rest of the rally.”
Kris Meeke, Rally Argentina – Photo Credit Citroen Racing
Khalid Al Qassimi (15th)
“With the fog we experienced in recce, my pace notes weren’t perfect but we made it to the end of this leg whilst making steady progress. Although the first loop was difficult, I felt more confident on the afternoon loop thanks to the adjustments to my C3 WRC’ set-up by the technical team.”
Day Two – Saturday!
The crews had seven stages and 146.88km of action! The top cars would run in opposite order – Al Qassimi, Suninen, Evans, Lappi, Mikkelsen, Breen, Ogier, Sordo, Neuville, Meeke, Tänak.
Ott started the day where he left off, winning from Kris and extending his lead over the Citroen driver. Seb was doing his best to stay with the leaders but lost more time.
Stage ten saw the crews face the fog and Al Qassimi really struggled with this, using the brakes a lot just to be sure he’d complete the stage. Thierry and Dani were the closest challengers to Ott who won the stage, but Kris fell back a little and now the gap between them was over 30 seconds. Thierry was now closer to Kris as a result.
Stage eleven saw more fog and a longer stage at 40km’s! Craig rolled out after losing control over a jump and his teammate Kris fell behind Thierry. We saw a welcome return to the front of Elfyn Evans who set the third fastest time and moved up one place to seventh. Ott’s lead was now a pretty comfortable 43 seconds.
The short 6km super special saw Thierry take a stage victory, his measured approach paying dividends, now ten seconds ahead of Kris. Dani was also driving well, his gap over Seb growing and hoping to take points away from Seb to benefit Hyundai’s best hope for the drivers’ championship (Thierry).
Ott continued to set the pace at the front in the first afternoon stage, number thirteen, and continued to open the gap over Thierry and Kris and was looking pretty comfortable.
The fog had now gone from the next stage, but Kris reported that it was very low grip after wearing his tyres more in the previous stage. He was now almost a minute behind the leader. The Hyundai twins of Thierry and Dani set exactly the same time, just 2.1 seconds slower than Ott.
The second running of the 40km stage saw disaster for Kris who ran over a stone and got a puncture immediately. He and Paul changed the tyre as fast as they could, but still lost two and a half minutes meaning that they dropped to eighth overall. The top three was now Ott followed by Thierry and Dani.
The Spaniard won the stage, ending Ott’s run of fastest times today. Esapekka also moved ahead of Elfyn into sixth after setting the second fastest time.
After all the drama, the top ten at the end of Saturday looked like this-
Classification after Day Two
1
O. Tänak
M. Järveoja
Toyota Yaris WRC
2:58:33.9
2
T. Neuville
N. Gilsoul
Hyundai i20 Coupe WRC
+46.5
3
D. Sordo
C. del Barrio
Hyundai i20 Coupe WRC
+1:08.2
4
S. Ogier
J. Ingrassia
Ford Fiesta WRC
+1:59.0
5
A. Mikkelsen
A. Jæger
Hyundai i20 Coupe WRC
+2:13.8
6
E. Lappi
J. Ferm
Toyota Yaris WRC
+2:42.9
7
E. Evans
D. Barritt
Ford Fiesta WRC
+2:49.1
8
K. Meeke
P. Nagle
Citroën C3 WRC
+3:20.4
9
T. Suninen
M. Markkula
Ford Fiesta WRC
+4:17.6
Here’s the views then, starting with the top three.
Ott Tänak
“Everything has been working really well. I have a very good feeling with the car, and especially so on today’s roads, which were fast and flowing and suit our car very well. I was not pushing as hard as yesterday, when I was really on the limit. Today there was maybe a bit more control, but still the times were clearly quite good. This morning we had some really tricky conditions with really thick fog, but we managed it well and this afternoon was very enjoyable. I need to show respect for tomorrow’s stages, because El Condor and Mina Clavero are very tough pieces of road and very different compared to today, but I am feeling confident.”
Thierry Neuville
“I am pleased to have moved up into second place in the overall classification. We have had to stay really focused today. We lost a bit of time early on as we tackled the foggy morning stages but pushed as hard as we could. In the afternoon, with soft tyres, we had to take things carefully to avoid risking a puncture. We could have done a bit more but it wasn’t necessary. Ott has a commanding lead of this rally so our target tomorrow is to secure second place and maximise points for both championships.”
Dani Sordo
“The opening loop was really difficult in the fog, and it was impossible not to lose some time getting through in those conditions. Things improved at the end of the long stage but it offered a tough start to the day. The fight for the podium places has been quite open. The final stage went really well – although I was a bit scared of the tyres because we were on the limit. We couldn’t afford a single mistake so we drove clean and just enjoyed it. In the end, the time was good and we moved back up to third. We will do all we can to keep this position on Sunday.”
2018 FIA World Rally Championship Round 05, Rally Argentina 26-29 April 2018 Dani Sordo, Carlos Del Barrio, Hyundai i20 Coupe WRC Photographer: Austral Worldwide copyright: Hyundai Motorsport GmbH
M-Sport Ford WRT
Sébastien Ogier (4th) said:
“I wasn’t committed enough to go for it in the fog this morning. I was a bit too careful and maybe also a bit distracted when I got the message that Craig [Breen] and Esapekka [Lappi] were stopped – thinking something worse would be coming. At least we are here now – finishing the day in the points which isn’t too bad for the championship.
“Dani [Sordo] did a great job today and it would have been difficult to catch him anyway. It looks as though we’re not as fast here as we have been at the previous events. Like last year we struggled with the pace and we’re not exactly sure why – so at the end of the day fourth position is not too bad.
“Tomorrow we will of course try to hold on to this position, and it would be good to grab some extra points in the power stage. The three stages tomorrow are the toughest challenge of the weekend. We’ll have to see what the weather does and – if it turns out to be foggy as it so often does on El Condor – it will be a challenge for sure.”
Elfyn Evans (7th) said:
“It’s been another tough day to be honest, and we were still struggling in all the clean stages. We were able to make a difference in the fog – pushing very hard and setting a pretty decent time – but we’re still not where we would like to be and need to find the answer.”
Teemu Suninen (9th) said:
“We’ve been the second car on the road today so we had a lot of cleaning to do. I was a bit disappointed with the time in last stage, but it’s all a learning curve and all okay. Tomorrow we will experience another completely different type of stage where the roads are a lot slower and a lot narrower. I’ve still got some homework to do, but hopefully next time we will be better.”
Hyundai Motorsport
Andreas Mikkelsen (5th)
“We have used today to try and make up some places after our issue on Friday. The fact we are back into the top-five is a positive result considering where we were at the start of the day. We have made some changes to the car during the day in a bid to find more rear stability and there was a definite improvement. We are not a million miles behind Seb in fourth place but we are just trying to drive neat and tidy, and we’ll see where we end up tomorrow. As we’ve seen again today, this is a particularly tough and unpredictable rally.”
Toyota Gazoo Racing WRT
Esapekka Lappi
“This morning started well: the car was working well and the setup felt good. Then on the long stage, I got a wrong pace-note, and in the fog, I couldn’t see anything and we went a long way off the road.
Luckily, we didn’t hit anything. This can happen, we are only human. The afternoon was really promising.
We all know the potential is there in the car, as Ott has been showing since yesterday, and I’m getting there step by step. I had some strong times and the road was getting cleaner for the drivers behind me, so, I’m pretty pleased with the speed. Every day is different here on Rally Argentina, and tomorrow’s stages are the slowest, very technical and narrow with a lot of rocks. Therefore, I don’t know if I can have the same confidence tomorrow, but I will certainly try for sure.”
2018 FIA World Rally Championship / Round 05, Rally Argentina / April 26-19, 2018// Worldwide Copyright: Toyota Gazoo Racing WRC
Citroen Abu Dhabi Racing WRT
Kris Meeke (8th)
“There was a stone in the middle of the road and I couldn’t avoid it, given the width of the road. Unfortunately, I got a puncture straight away on the right rear tyre. It’s a shame because I was both quick and consistent, and I clearly felt capable of securing third place.”
Khalid Al Qassimi (14th)
“It wasn’t an easy day for us, mainly due to the fact we opened the road all day, which meant we spent the morning especially cleaning the road for those behind. I enjoyed the afternoon driving a C3 WRC that was more precise, despite making a minor mistake, which fortunately had no serious consequences.”
Craig Breen (DNF)
“Unfortunately, I turned in a bit too soon on a right-hander over a crest. I realised that I was going to hit a ditch so I tried to steer to avoid it but it was too little, too late and when we landed, we were thrown into a roll. Obviously, I’m sorry for the team, who deserved a better result, and am frustrated not to have been able to complete any more miles at this event, where I’m already short on experience. But I have to focus on the speed we showed at certain points and will aim to come back stronger in Portugal.”
Day Three – Sunday!
The last day then and with 55km’s spread between three stages and the narrowest stages including a double run of the iconic El Condor stage, with the added twist of running in the opposite direction this event could still throw up a surprise. The start list looked like this- Al Qassimi, Suninen, Meeke, Evans, Lappi, Mikkelsen, Ogier, Sordo, Neuville, Tänak.
Kris and Citroen were using the final day to test some changes and settings for Portugal and clearly it worked after setting the fourth fastest time and climbing one place to seventh. Esapekka lost a chunk of time dropping from sixth to eighth. Andreas won the stage with Seb just half a second slower and Ott third fastest with his lead now at 49 seconds, only disaster would stop him winning!
The penultimate stage, the longest of the final day at 22km. Tanak was taking a measured approach, whilst Thierry won the stage from Andreas and Dani. Despite being the third car on the road, Kris set a good time, just twelve seconds slower than Thierry for sixth fastest, the settings for Portugal proving their worth.
So, to the final stage and Thierry blazed through the stage and beat Seb to the power stage victory, taking all five points with Andreas third, Ott fourth and Kris fifth despite having to avoid a dog which he blamed for losing him half a second.
However, it was Ott Tanak’s weekend. He’d won his third rally and his first for Toyota. It was also their first victory of the year! He’d set the pace all weekend and brought himself into a championship battle with Seb and Thierry.
Final Overall Classification – Rally Argentina
1
O. Tänak
M. Järveoja
Toyota Yaris WRC
3:43:28.9
2
T. Neuville
N. Gilsoul
Hyundai i20 Coupe WRC
+37.7
3
D. Sordo
C. del Barrio
Hyundai i20 Coupe WRC
+1:15.7
4
S. Ogier
J. Ingrassia
Ford Fiesta WRC
+1:58.6
5
A. Mikkelsen
A. Jæger
Hyundai i20 Coupe WRC
+2:02.6
6
E. Evans
D. Barritt
Ford Fiesta WRC
+3:06.3
7
K. Meeke
P. Nagle
Citroën C3 WRC
+3:25.7
8
E. Lappi
J. Ferm
Toyota Yaris WRC
+4:32.6
9
T. Suninen
M. Markkula
Ford Fiesta WRC
+5:38.6
10
P. Tidemand
J. Andersson
Škoda Fabia R5
+12:15.8
Let’s hear what he had to say.
Ott Tänak
“It is very special to take my first win with the team. We have been improving the car very quickly, and it is now pretty much how I like it. It has been giving me great confidence. It is also great to see how much the team has been supporting me. To dominate a rally like this for the first time is very nice, but it has definitely not been easy. Earlier in the weekend I was pushing a lot. As the gap was growing it was possible for us to control it more and more, and today we were more on the safe side. The direction is good and we are closing up in the championship. It is still fairly early in the season, so now we just need to keep going in the same way in the coming rallies.”
2018 FIA World Rally Championship / Round 05, Rally Argentina / April 26-19, 2018// Worldwide Copyright: Toyota Gazoo Racing WRC
Thierry Neuville
“I am thrilled to finish on the podium in Argentina and to have taken the Power Stage win. It has been something of a relief after the difficulties we had in Corsica, as we have been on the pace all weekend and felt completely comfortable with our Hyundai i20 Coupe WRC. The team has really done a great job for this rally and I am hugely thankful for everyone’s contribution. We knew we had to push on the Power Stage to take as many points as we could off Séb, and we were able to do that. I’m happy with what we take away from Argentina and look forward to Portugal.”
2018 FIA World Rally Championship Round 05, Rally Argentina 26-29 April 2018 Photographer: Helena El Mokni Worldwide copyright: Hyundai Motorsport GmbH
Dani Sordo
“What a fantastic rally this has been for the whole team. I am really happy to take my second podium of the season alongside Carlos, and to continue to show a competitive pace. The stage times have been very close all weekend long with lots of fighting for positions each day. Above all it has been a positive event for the team with a double podium that scores good manufacturer points. We didn’t take too many risks on this final day, concentrating on finishing third. Thankfully we had a decent buffer so could complete our mission to take the podium. We have had a huge support from the fans – we hope they enjoyed the show!”
M-Sport Ford WRT
Sébastien Ogier (4th)
“There was an amazing atmosphere this weekend and I’ve never seen so many fans out on the stages. It wasn’t an easy rally for us and we need to work on some areas to improve. But when you come away from a difficult event with 16 points, it’s not so bad.
“As expected, the stages were challenging again today. They were rough and slow with very low grip – and we weren’t super-fast in those conditions. We had to push hard to try and make a good time in the Power Stage, and we managed to grab four points which was important.”
Elfyn Evans (6th)
“All things considered, sixth place isn’t a bad result and it was good to get some solid points on the board. But the pace just wasn’t there this weekend. It was disappointing and not what we came here to do. We need to do some analysis to try and understand why that was. The engineers will study the data, I’ll study the onboards, and hopefully we can get back on it in Portugal.”
Teemu Suninen (9th)
“It’s been a challenging weekend, but I have to say that the car has been amazing. It’s really nice to drive and really easy to drive. From that side I really enjoyed the rally – even though I would have liked to have been a bit faster.
“On Friday we weren’t able to set the fast times and that gave us the worst starting position for the next two days. It’s like that for everyone, but we need to work on having a better Friday so that we have a better starting position for the weekend.
“But overall it has been a good experience – not an easy one, but a good one. Next year it will be much easier to prepare as we’ll know what to expect and what the biggest challenges will be.”
Hyundai Motorsport
Andreas Mikkelsen (5th)
“Firstly, I extend my congratulations to Thierry, Nicolas, Dani and Carlos for their podium results here in Argentina. From the team’s point of view, this was a very competitive weekend with all three cars inside the top-five. We had a positive final day with a stage win, a second place and three points from the Power Stage. Obviously, we would have liked to fight those couple of places higher up but unfortunately our time loss on Friday prevented us from doing that. It has been a very closely fought and tough weekend, which has been a pretty good start to the run of gravel events.”
Citroen Abu Dhabi Racing WRT
Kris Meeke (7th)
“It was a good day for us: we did set-up tests for Portugal and it was informative. The feeling was very good in the car. Apart from that, and the frustration of not being able to bring home the result that we deserved, the main thing for me is that the upgrades introduced this weekend to the C3 WRC enabled us to be a lot more consistent. I felt confident throughout the weekend, even when fighting for the podium. I felt that I had the situation under control at all times and we need to keep going in this direction.”
Khalid Al Qassimi (14th)
“Obviously, I’m disappointed for the team that we didn’t manage to secure a result that would reflect our real performance level. Nevertheless, I’m pleased to see our C3 WRC make regular progress and I’m convinced that this will lead to some good results very shortly. On a more personal note, running first on the road didn’t make life easy for me today, but I was happy to be back with the team and enjoy the atmosphere of the championship again.”
Toyota Gazoo Racing WRT
Esapekka Lappi (8th)
“I can take home some positives from my first Rally Argentina. My speed was actually better than I was expecting on my first time here. It helped that we seemed to have the best car here: Ott controlled the whole rally, congratulations to him. We had many issues with punctures during the weekend and we need to investigate what was causing them. Although we had many things that caused us to lose time, we managed to do all the stages and get the experience. This first part of the season was never going to be easy, with events I did not have enough experience on, but there have been positive moments and I will take this on to Portugal.”
The next round is in Portugal, held from the 17th of 20th of May. I think we are set for an amazing mid season, with just twenty-eight points between first and third places. Also Mads makes his second start of the year with Citroen and they are bringing three cars to the party!
Thierry should be very happy with his result, bringing the gap down to Seb to just ten points. Hayden Paddon is re-joining the Hyundai team in Portugal as well and will want to do well.
Finally, Elfyn and Dan will want to get a good result there as well. They’ve not had the best start to their campaign.
2018 FIA World Rally Championship for Drivers’ Standings After round 5
1
S. Ogier
100
2
T. Neuville
90
3
O. Tanak
72
4
A. Mikkelsen
54
5
D. Sordo
45
6
K. Meeke
43
7
E. Lappi
40
8
J.M Latvala
31
9
E. Evans
26
10
C. Breen
20
11
S. Loeb
15
12
H. Paddon
10
2018 FIA World Rally Championship for Manufacturers’ Standings After round 5
