With Kris Meeke and Paul Nagle’s win and
the sixth place secured by Stéphane Lefebvre/Gabin Moreau, the Citroën Total
Abu Dhabi WRT enjoyed its best weekend since the start of the year. On the
season’s only mixed-surface rally, the team led by Yves Matton was able to
demonstrate the potential of the C3 WRC on all surfaces and prove the value of
all the hard work undertaken in recent months.
Rally de
España began on Friday morning, with the first leg contested predominantly on gravel.
Kris Meeke quickly established himself among the leaders. After claiming a
stage win on Bot (SS2), he held fifth place at the midday service despite being
handicapped by running with soft tyres, which had suffered in the heat and on
the tarmac sections of Terra Alta (SS3). In the afternoon, the Briton was
fastest again on SS5 and moved up into third position overall, 3s behind the
leader.
Following a 75-minute
service, during which the Red Army’s mechanics converted the cars to their
tarmac configuration, the rally continued on the wide, fast and flowing roads
of Catalonia. Despite a brief shower on El Montmell (SS7), Meeke grabbed the
stage win and with it, the overall lead. On the following stage, he was faster
than his direct rivals to stretch his lead to over fifteen seconds.
The rest of
the day saw some incredibly close times set by those at the top of the
leaderboard with Kris heading back to parc ferme with a 13s lead over Sébastien
Ogier and 14.5s clear of Ott Tänak.
Sunday’s
third and final leg featured six stages without a service halt. Under cover of
darkness, the no.7 C3 WRC driver warned his rivals of what was to come with his
first stage win on L’Albiol (SS14). He also won the next two stages to complete
a clean sweep on the first loop, extending his lead to 23.9s.
After
claiming another two stage wins – meaning he won a total of eight out of
nineteen speed tests – Meeke eased off slightly on the Power Stage. He still
set second fastest time before climbing onto the roof of his C3 WRC to
celebrate the win!
At the
finish, Kris commented: "20 years ago I walked into this very stage to
watch Colin McRae in the Subaru. I never thought then that I would be back here
driving a rally car."
Yves Matton, Citroën Racing Team Principal, added: “We certainly needed a result
like this to confirm the way in which we had begun to turn things around at
Rallye Deutschland. This win highlights the good work that everyone has done
and confirmed that the decisions that I took at the end of the spring were
well-founded and warranted. Despite our constraints and the time needed to
adapt to new working methods, we have shown that we were capable of reacting
and that Citroën Racing remains one the leading teams in the World Rally
Championship. The reliability and strength of the cars have also been
excellent.”
Elfyn Evans in
the DMACK Ford Fiesta rued his choice of soft compound tyres for Sunday’s final
four speed tests. He was also overhauled by Ireland’s Craig Breen, who snatched
fifth in the final stage despite landing from a jump with such force that it
cracked his Citroen C3’s windscreen. The gap was 1.9sec!
Jari-Matti Latvala was sidelined after a
heavy impact on Friday damaged the Toyota’s lubrication system while Thierry
Neuville suffered misfortune on the final morning. The Belgian was forced to
stop at the end of SS16 (Santa Marina) after sustaining damage to the front
right of his Hyundai i20 Coupe WRC after cutting a corner.
Final Overall Classification - Rally de España
1, K. Meeke/P. Nagle (Citroën C3 WRC) 3:01:21.1
1, K. Meeke/P. Nagle (Citroën C3 WRC) 3:01:21.1
2, S. Ogier/J.
Ingrassia (Ford Fiesta WRC) +28.0
3, O. Tänak/M.
Järveoja (Ford Fiesta WRC) +33.0
4, J.
Hänninen/K. Lindström (Toyota Yaris WRC) +54.1
5, M.
Østberg/T. Eriksen (Ford Fiesta WRC) +2:26.2
6, S.
Lefebvre/G. Moreau (Citroën C3 WRC) +2:43.0
7, E. Evans/D.
Barritt (Ford Fiesta WRC) +4:37.4
