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Up next is Dyfnant and Aberhirnant, and as you may have worked out they're both in the dark.

There are a few issues with the lack of light, mainly visibility. 10 points if you guessed that. The real issue could be from bodywork. If the cars have clipped or moved a bumper earlier today, it could thrown the angle of their lamp-pods off and make visibility even more difficult.

The second major issue will be steam and water in the car. Many drivers reported up steamed up windows earlier on and that could really prove troublesome.
Hello and welcome to the most exciting duo of stages you're going to see for quite some time!
Over on our F1 service, you can follow Brazilian Grand Prix qualifying shortly, then join us back here for some after-dark rallying fun at 6.20pm. See you then.
So there's still tension in whether Tanak can hold off Sordo for fourth and Paddon likewise with Evans for seventh, plus Ostberg and Kubica's potential recovery drives.

However the real battle isn't driver versus driver now, it's driver versus extremely wet and muddy Welsh forest in total darkness. They've found it hard enough to stay in the road in murky daylight, now they've got to do it again at night when they return in three hours time.
And this is how it leaves the frontrunners overall:

1 Ogier
2 Meeke +30.5s
3 Mikkelsen +57.1s
4 Tanak +2m24.6s
5 Sordo +2m34.4s
6 Paddon +3m01.2s
7 Evans +3m09.6s
8 Ostberg +3m47.5s
9 Lefebvre +5m01.7s
10 Bertelli +6m03.3s
(11 Kubica +6m09.0s)
Here's the result from that tricky little grubby-gravel-tyres-on-asphalt blast:

1 Tanak 1m33.3s
2 Mikkelsen +0.1s
3 Ogier +0.2
4 Evans +1.3s
5 Sordo +1.6s
6 Lefebvre +1.8s
In fact on that pace Kubica is about to lose 10th to Bertelli as he's dropped 17s on this tiny stage. His luck is pretty consistent(ly terrible) this year.
In the overall battles that are still fairly close, Tanak is now 9.8s ahead of Sordo for fourth, and Paddon's gap over Evans is down to 8.4s in the fight for sixth.

There's potentially a fight for 10th too as Kubica isn't far ahead of Bertelli, and is struggling with a differential problem.

"It's rear wheel drive, in the two stages before it was cutting and I was thinking it was the tyres, but now it's completely gone," Kubica explains.
A new pacesetter on the stage: Tanak is a tenth quicker than Mikkelsen, which cements his fourth place overall ahead of Sordo.
Paddon says the road accident isn't that big a problem compared to the transmission issue he's been battling for a while now.

"The car's fine, there's just this gearbox problem that means you don't know when you should use the pedal and when you should use the lever," he explains.
Paddon completes the stage slowest, 2.8s down on pacesetter Mikkelsen. Let's see what he has to say about that Prokop shunt...
Crowd darling Evans is third quickest on the stage. In the overall battle his mission is to catch Paddon for sixth. We're yet to find out the full implications of Paddon's prang with Prokop on the road section after the last stage.
Meeke's lost that lead he was temporarily handed, but second is just fine for him against Ogier in tricky conditions, he says.

"Everything's going fine. Just trying to be as careful as we can. Mads had a mistake and I really, really can't afford a mistake.

"For me I've always known there's no chance to take on Ogier in a straight fight. I'm content where I am."
Meeke is in, he's quicker than Ostberg but loses another 1.6s to Ogier, leaving him half a minute adrift overall now.
Ostberg is still driving with a hole in the floor of his DS 3. And on a very wet and muddy and Welsh day, that's not ideal.

"It's not in front of my face so it's not disturbing in that way, but it's a thing I want to get rid of because it's a lot of work to get the water out of the car."
The Citroens of Ostberg and Meeke are next up. Ostberg is through, 2.1s off the pace. His tumble from fourth to eighth place early this afternoon was courtesy of a trip into a ditch that left him needing assistance and struggling to close a damaged door.
There's not really anything for Mikkelsen to fight for now, with third pretty much in his pocket.

"It's not easy to know the grip with gravel tyres on the wet Tarmac," he admits. "Not easy to judge the braking. But a clean stage for us and no problems."
Mikkelsen pips his team-mate by 0.1s to become pacesetter for now.
"It's different for sure, but it was OK for me," says Ogier of the return to asphalt. "I was a little cautious but there's more to lose than to do in here."
That looks like a picture from last year from the rally organisers there as the weather looks positively summery...

After that word from a British rallying co-driving legend, we're under way at Chirk with Ogier on the stage.
A short but sweet (and spectator friendly) end to the daytime section of leg two coming up. Here's Elfyn Evans' description of the Chirk Castle stage that starts in about 10 minutes:

SS13 Chirk Castle (1.28 miles)
Chirk Castle is one of the stately home-style stages that are now part of Wales Rally GB. They’ve proved really popular over the past few years and it’s great to have Chirk back again in 2015. The stage hasn’t changed at all in the last couple of years and it can be a tricky one with the leaves on the ground. If it’s wet, it can be quite entertaining to drive the car on the asphalt with the gravel set-up.
UPDATED rally order after 12 stages.

1 Ogier 2h19m50.7s
2 Meeke +28.9s
3 Mikkelsen +57.2s
4 Tanak +2m24.8s
5 Sordo +2m33.0s
6 Paddon +2m58.5s
UPDATE: Remember that point where Meeke took the lead? No more.

Ogier's SS11 time has been adjusted to reflect his delay in waiting for the stricken Hyundai of Thierry Neuville to be removed. His time changes to 11m03.3s which makes him fastest on that stage.

Overall, that leaves Ogier 28.9s ahead of Meeke.
It appears both Prokop and Paddon took a wrong turning after the stage and then met head-on as they tried to get back to the correct course.
Prokop's car isn't moving and the team have sent a tow truck to the scene. Could that be it for Prokop?

Paddon was running sixth before the incident. As it happened on the road section assuming he doesn't incur any late penalties he'll keep that place. But could any potential damage hinder his progress?
UPDATE: Reports in that Paddon and Prokop have collided on a road section at a hairpin. They came from opposite directions and met at the hairpin.

Paddon has headed off to SS13 while we don't have any word on Prokop. More to come as we get it.
The rest of the day is going to be absolutely excellent, take it from us. Next up is the Chirk Castle stage, before a quick service and then two hammer down runs through Dyfnant and Aberhirnant as we have just done. However, the two stages full of standing water will run IN THE DARK later on, making any sixth gear aquaplaning moments even more hairy!
Up next is the Chirk Castle stage, which caught a few drivers out last year. It's not what Roger Clark would call a "mickey mouse" stage, put it that way!

Talking of Clark, it was excellent to see a co-driver driving a road section yesterday. Ola Floene took over driving duties for Andreas Mikkelsen on the way back from Myherin last night.

Clark would often relinquish driving duties to Tony Mason, but that was when the rally was a million miles long, or something close.
Craig Breen continues to front-run in WRC2 despite being all but out of the battle for the class win. He's a minute and a half behind second-placed Suninen after his puncture while leading yesterday.
Flicking back to WRC runners and a Jack Benyon trademark Moffett update.

On SS12, Josh and Sam set EXACTLY the same time over the run. Incredible stuff.
So with the WRC guys through, up next is WRC2.

Eric Camili - who led WRC2 heading into this stage - has been under pressure from a charging Finn doing his best Juha Kankkunen impression. That would be Teemu Sunninen.

However, Camili has done his best Didier Auriol impression and pulled away slightly, extending his lead to 12.1s overall.

Teemu will appreciate all those Toyota references. Despite the fact he is confusingly driving a Skoda, he's a works driver for the Japanese firm.
Don't forget to check times after this afternoon's service, where Ogier should re-take the lead when he's given a different time for SS11. He was held up by a Neuville roll (sounds tasty that doesn't it?) and lost the lead to Meeke in the process.

As it stands, Meeke leads by 2.1s.
And the rally overall after SS12:

1 Meeke 2h20m19.6s
2 Ogier +2.1s
3 Mikkelsen +57.2s
4 Tanak +2m24.8s
5 Sordo +2m33.0s
6 Paddon +2m58.5s

By: Matt Beer

Published: