The drama continues at the Rally Sardinia: Adrien Fourmaux has to give up his fight for victory after a nightmare morning
Sebastien Ogier continues to lead the Rally Italy in Sardinia after temporarily losing his lead in the dust of Adrien Fourmaux, whose hopes of a first victory in the 2025 World Rally Championship (WRC) were dashed on Saturday morning.
Ogier had extended his lead from 2.1 seconds overnight after winning the first stage on Saturday to 7.4 seconds before disaster struck on the eighth stage (Lerno to Su Filigosu 1, 24.34 kilometers).
Fourmaux hit a rock that was not marked in his pace notes and suffered a front right tire puncture after five kilometers on the rough gravel stage. He initially continued, but then decided to change the wheel on his Hyundai i20 N Rally1 at kilometer 16.
Although Fourmaux resumed his drive after a wheel change that took around two minutes, he was only about a kilometer ahead of Ogier on the track. Ogier’s visibility was severely impaired by the dust kicked up, which prevented him from maintaining his speed. As a result, Ogier lost 29.7 seconds to Hyundai driver Ott Tänak, who set the fastest time and moved up from third place to the top of the overall standings.
After a protest, the organizers quickly calculated a correction time for Ogier to compensate for the time he lost due to the dust from Fourmaux. This put the eight-time world champion back in the lead. Ogier then also won the ninth stage – the last of the morning loop – and extended his lead over Tänak to 15.0 seconds.
Tänak was 10.5 seconds slower than Ogier on the rough final stage of the morning after suffering a tear in his right rear tire. Fortunately, he did not have to change the wheel and still managed to finish the stage.
Toyota driver Kalle Rovanperä moved up to third place (+37.5 seconds) after Fourmaux’s tire damage. The two-time world champion felt much more comfortable behind the wheel after extensive setup changes overnight. Rovanperä started the day in fifth place and had already taken fourth place from teammate Sami Pajari after the seventh stage.
Pajari put in a strong performance in Sardinia and held on to fourth place despite contact with trees on the ninth stage. He was 1:05.3 minutes ahead of championship leader Elfyn Evans. Evans worked his way up to fifth place after losing 1:09.8 minutes on Friday when he had to open the stage. Toyota’s Takamoto Katsuta finished seventh after losing time on Friday due to a slow rollover.
For Fourmaux, the misfortune continued: he was distracted by dust entering the cockpit, veered off the track in the ninth stage and ended up in the trees. Although he was able to continue, he lost more time after another slip and finished the stage 55.1 seconds behind. This dropped the Frenchman to ninth place overall, 4:36.6 minutes behind Ogier.
Thierry Neuville (Hyundai) and M-Sport drivers Josh McErlean and Gregoire Munster returned to the race after retiring on Friday. However, Munster struggled with brake problems on his Ford Puma on Saturday morning.
In the afternoon, all teams will repeat the three stages.
