Junior WRC in Italy: Solans lead cut
Spain’s Nil Solans continued to lead round two of the FIA Junior WRC at Rally Italia Sardegna but his advantage was cut after taking a wrong turn.
He lost around 12sec with the mistake in SS12 and is now 26.7sec clear after winning three of the day’s six tough speed tests in a Ford Fiesta R2.
“It’s been a really difficult day, there were so many big stones and rocks – some you could try to drive around and some that you just couldn’t avoid,” he said.
“But we’ve again just been trying to find the balance between speed and trying not to damage the car. Hopefully tomorrow the stages won’t be as bad.”
Frenchman Nicolas Ciamin increased his pace today, topping the timesheets on the remaining three stages to jump to second.
“We pushed hard today to try and catch Nil and the pace was pretty good, I was happy with it. It was just a shame that we got held up behind Terry and lost time in the dust. We made some changes to our pacenotes for this rally and they’re working well now,” he said.
It was a tough afternoon for Terry Folb who dropped nearly three minutes with a puncture to slip to fourth. His problem slowed Ciamin’s charge as he was caught in the dust of the ailing car for around 10km.
Folb’s problem allowed Julius Tannert to move into the final podium place after a clean day. Fifth-placed Dennis Rådström took his first fastest time of the season after tying with Solans on the opening test, while Rob Duggan held sixth.
Estonian Miko Niinemae retired after injuring his back after a hard landing over a jump.
