Sebastien Ogier took the lead at the Monte Carlo Rally on Friday afternoon after his namesake Loeb made a mistake and damaged the suspension of his Citroen.
Ogier initially reduced Loeb's lead to just three seconds, and returnee Loeb only managed to increase that to six seconds again in the sixth speed test. But on the muddy trials that followed, Ogier shone. The current world champion took the lead in the rally with the Volkswagen Polo in the next, seventh test, in which he was 14 seconds faster than Loeb. This was helped by a mistake by Loeb, who tried to reduce the eight-second gap on the last test of the day, where he made another mistake and crashed into the rock with his back left wheel, breaking the clamp.
With a damaged car, he "pulled" to the finish line of the test and then tried to satisfy the rules with emergency repair, which dictate that the car must have all four wheels and mounts undamaged and functional, and drive to the service area. But the emergency repair didn’t hold up, so Loeb will join the rally tomorrow under Rally2 rules.
“It was a slow and icy turn, maybe I started accelerating a little too fast… but definitely too early,” the nine-time world champion commented on the resignation. “At the exit of the bend there was a small ditch into which I slipped, and there in the snow hid a rock into which we collided.
We’ll be back tomorrow and maybe we can score a few points, but we’re definitely not going to get a great result for Citroen, which makes me very sorry. I’m not going to score points for myself because I don’t need them. I will just enjoy the ride tomorrow, ”added Loeb.
The problems of the Citroen racer opened the door for Ogier, who was 1 minute and 45 seconds ahead of team rival Jari-Matti Latvalo at the end of the day, and Andreas Mikkelsen, who was third before the last day of events in Monte Carlo, complemented the team's success.
As good as the day was for Volkswagen, it was bad for Citroen, as in addition to Loeb, Kris Meeke, who was in fourth place before resigning, also broke the suspension of the car.
“At Citroen, they had a bad luck,” commented Jost Capito, head of Volkswagen, on the day. “We don’t like that because we wanted to continue the fight on the track,” he added.
Robert Kubica drove off the road twice after two morning tests on the eighth test. One time he was helped back on the track by spectators, and the second time, after a close encounter with a tree, his tire burst. The Pole lost four minutes, but after ten minutes, which he lost yesterday, when he ran into problems with electronics due to another trip off the track, his ranking in the rally did not deteriorate significantly.
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