There was an incredible ending to the RallyRACC-Catalunya when world champion Ogier threw away a seemingly unassailable 50.9s lead on the final test. The split times indicated that he was fastest up to the mid-stage split but he then crashed into a guardrail.
The Frenchman’s misfortune provided 26-year old Andreas Mikkelsen with his maiden world championship victory to add to his score of 12 top-three finishes in the Polo R WRC/Michelin since 2013. The Norwegian is the 75th driver to win a WRC round since the championship’s creation in 1973.
Prior to this last-minute surprise, he had been battling for second spot with Latvala and the VW/Michelin pair was split by just 1.4s going into the last stage. “I still can’t believe it,” he said after the finish before embracing team boss Jost Capito. “We had simply decided to push on the Power Stage to try to defend our second place.”
Dani Sordo (Hyundai) had also been battling with Mikkelsen and Latvala but the Spaniard appeared to have settled for fourth place in order to make sure of important championship points for Hyundai-Shell WRT. In the end, the fortunate Spaniard was able to join the podium celebrations for the 38th time of his career. “The team called me to say Ogier had crashed. I feel sorry for him. This morning, I had hoped Latvala or Mikkelsen might make a mistake, but not Seb…”
Further down the order, there was an interesting fight between Citroën and Hyundai’s Mads Ostberg (4th), Kris Meeke (5th), Hayden Paddon (6th) and Thierry Neuville (8th). The latter dropped five minutes with a transmission problem on the last stage.
The result leaves the French make four points clear of its Korean rival in the 2015 Manufacturers’ standings ahead of the season’s finale in Wales.
Before the Spanish event, M-Sport had been in contention for the silver medal, too, but its drivers Ott Tanak and Elfyn Evans crashed out in quick succession on Saturday. Buoyed by three stage victories on Friday’s dirt, the Estonian was running an impressive third overall when he left the road.
Robert Kubica (Ford) was also poorly rewarded for his efforts on gravel and asphalt and he even topped the leaderboard early on before his chances were ruined by a puncture.
The WRC2 classification was dominated throughout by Pontus Tidemand (Skoda/Michelin). His team-mate Jan Kopecky overcame a power-steering problem on SS10 to earn another one-two finish for Skoda Motorsport, while Nasser Al-Attiyah ended up third – one-tenth clear of Armin Kremer – to claim his second straight WRC2 title! Frenchman Eric Camilli (Ford) had been third before his retirement on the last day.
Marius Aasen was the man to beat in the Fiesta Trophy on gravel and asphalt alike and he leaves Spain with the 2015 cup in his suitcase. His chief challengers Max Vatanen (turbo hose) and Tom Cave both dropped big chunks of time.
After securing the Junior title in France, Quentin Gilbert added the WRC3 trophy to his 2015 winnings thanks to his fourth class win of the year.
(*) subject to publication of the official results by the FIA.