The pristine wintry covering that fell over southeast France earlier this week has practically disappeared. Today’s edition of Gap’s local newspaper, which features the headline “Ogier OK, Loeb KO”, reports that an important skiing competition has had to be cancelled due to the conditions.
Only the highest peaks show any signs of snow. True, as the temperature dipped to -5°C at dawn, the fields of northern Provence featured a picturesque coating of crisp frost, but even that soon disappeared with the morning’s sunshine.
In the middle of SS10 (‘Lardier et Valença-Faye’), things were a little more complex, though. The longest stage of the rally climbs to an altitude of almost 1,200 metres where, according to Ott Tanak’s ice-note crew, there were 10km of patchy ice in the shade. The other 40km were reported to be clear. “Difficult call for tyres…”
The crews made their choices for the two-stage loop before they learned that SS9 had been cancelled (spectators). However, because of its length, SS10 would have been their priority and, in the end, the front-runners all opted for asphalt Michelin racers. Volkswagen’s trio went for the ‘super-soft’ SS4 version, while the Citroën drivers fitted the harder S4 compound.
Obviously, everyone is disappointed that the Seb vs Seb battle is already over. Today, Loeb has returned thanks to the Rally2 ruling and is running at the front of the order, just one car ahead of Ogier, so it would have been nice to compare their times. Unfortunately, their respective missions are no longer the same…
There was concern when we learned that the VW driver was losing time, and he effectively dropped almost two minutes to Ford’s Robert Kubica who posted the fastest effort. But Ogier, who enjoyed an overnight lead of almost two minutes over team-mate Latvala, was taking no chances: “I didn’t have a problem, just no need to push, especially on the ice.”
With the communication of ‘split times’ to crews now banned, Jari-Matti had no idea of Ogier’s speed and was surprised to learn he had gained 40 seconds. “I had a spin and thought I was going to lose a minute or more,” he told us at the Stop Control.” Compared with Kubica, he did, but Ogier’s caution has allowed the Finn to close to within just over a minute of the lead. Enough to revive his hopes?
Mikkelsen (3rd) was fourth quickest and, more significantly, 10s better than fourth-placed Ostberg (Citroën, +2m28.1s) to go a little further clear in the now all-Norwegian battle for third place after Ott Tanak (Ford) lost a big chunk of time in a ditch.n
Elfyn Evans (Ford, +2m35.9s) is consequently up to fifth overall again.
For the record Loeb was third fastest (+41.2s).
Story and photo: Best-of-rally-live.com