The french team make a perfect rally as today keep the advantage by yesterday. After the service park in SS 20 Surkee 2 Sebastien Ogier / J. Ingrassia continue the rally with another stage win. The battle between Neuville and Ostberg continues as Ostberg finished behind Neuville but keep the second position overall.
Sordo coments after the stage: "Little bit of this stage very broken, the car touch everywhere. We have soft tyre."
Ostberg: "Very difficult conditions. I think we did quite ok, not perfect, but it is very difficult and easy to do a mistake."
In SS 21 Leustu 2 Neuville finished first as in the overall standing is 0.1 seconds behind Ostberg. Ostberg explains his result in the stage: "We had a half spin at a junction, I just do not know what happened. That was not good. It felt like I lost the power."
Neuville: "We had a half spin at a junction, I just do not know what happened. That was not good. It felt like I lost the power."
In the longest SS 22 Ouninpohja 2 with a distance of 33.01 km Sebastien Ogier takes the stage victory as Neuville keep the second position while Ostberg finished fifth at +24.4 seconds. Ostberg spin as he explains: "Maybe 25 kilometres into it, there was a massive rock in the road, so I had to go off the road to avoid it. The stone was far too massive and I had to avoid it otherwise it would have been the end of the rally."
This stage was the last for Kris Meeke who rolled in the stage four times. Both Meeke and his co-driver Chris Patterson are uninjured.
In the last SS 23 Painaa 2 (Power Stage) Thierry Neuville finished at top, while Ogier is second, thid position and one extra point for Latvala.
Ostberg: "It has been a very good weekend and it has been good to be back and fight for a rally a whole weekend. We end up being 3rd, still it is very nice to be back and build the confidence back up. I was really looking forward to Finland, it has been difficult season so far. It has been fantastic."
Neuville: "Unbelievable the feeling, I think we have done a very good job. A good clean run, smooth run. We can do a big party tonight. I could not imagine, but the car was so nice, with this budget to beat the Citroen and the other Ford team it is unbelievable."
Ogier: " I am so happy to join Didier for the French one. It has been a fantastic weekend. This weekend is just perfect, another big step to the title!"
Overall Results:
1. Sebastien Ogier / J. Ingrassia (Volkswagen Polo R WRC) 2:43:10.4
2. Thierry Neuville / Nicolas Gilsoul (Ford Fiesta RS WRC) +36.6
3. Mads Ostberg / Jonas Andersson (Ford Fiesta RS WRC) +57.6
4. Mikko Hirvonen / Jarmo Lehtinen (Citroen DS3 WRC) +1:21.6
5. Dani Sordo / C. Del Barrio (Citroen DS3 WRC) +6:08.5
6. Evgeny Novikov / Ilka Minor (Ford Fiesta RS WRC) +8:39.7