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General

Rally GB and Sepang MotoGP

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Stopwatch
Ogier completes in 4m19.6s, which puts him second quickest. Only six tenths dropped to Tanak, no dramas for the champion.
Speaking of Gorban, he'll be hoping his Sunday is smoother than the earlier part of his rally. Photo: McKlein

Speaking of Gorban, he'll be hoping his Sunday is smoother than the earlier part of his rally. Photo: McKlein

Information
Up the road, the first running of Brenig - which will also be used as the powerstage later in the day - is also underway. Al Rajhi is the first car away once again, and will be followed by Ukrainian Valeriy Gorban.
WRC
Tanak reaches the end of the stage in the fastest time so far, eight tenths up on Mikkelsen, but says that he's not taking any risks. Ogier is now in the stage.
WRC
Only Tanak and Ogier to come now before the WRC2 runners take to the stage. Will the Estonian go full-attack, or opt to consolidate?
Stopwatch
Hayden Paddon said he's trying a new style this weekend, reigning in his usually flamboyant driving style to improve traction out of the corners. The Kiwi goes faster than Meeke on a 4m21.3s and is slower only than Mikkelsen and Latvala, but team-mate Thierry Neuville sets exactly the same time to consolidate his 12.6s margin in third.
Quote
Meeke completes in 4m21.5s, which is unlikely to affect his fifth place on what has been a frustrating home rally for the Northern Irishman. "It was really tricky in high-speed braking, it was like ice in the junctions. We've got nothing to fight for today but we'll try and get into a good rhythm and enjoy the day."
WRC
After a standout drive on his home rally last time out, Dani Sordo hasn't gotten to grips with the Rally GB stages this weekend. He's currently fourth quickest, slower than Mikkelsen, Latvala and Lefebvre so far. Kris Meeke next through.
David Evans
Temperature of 12 degrees in the service park, with lots of high cloud around. Now given up predicting the weather. It might rain, it might not - cloud cover looks too solid for sunshine, but who knows? All I will say is the bloke guiding me into the car park was wearing a t-shirt at 0645 this morning.
Stopwatch
Ostberg struggles through the stage and loses 6.6 seconds to Latvala. His grip on seventh place now looks very loose, with the Polo now just 0.6 seconds behind.
WRC
Latvala goes second quickest so far through the 4.78 mile SS17, a second behind Mikkelsen. Mads Ostberg is currently in the stage, hoping to defend his 7.2 second lead.
Stopwatch
Eric Camilli and Stéphane Lefebvre are next to complete the stage. Citroen man Lefebvre is the fastest of the two Frenchman, 2.7s slower than Mikkelsen on his return to the WRC following that terrying shunt in Germany.
FV83.5
Matevos Isaakyan and then Louis Deletraz have displaced Aitken for pole as the session enters its final 20s...
FV83.5
Aitken's next flying lap, a 1m27.132s, puts him straight back on top.
Stopwatch
Little surprise, Andreas Mikkelsen is fastest through the stage so far with a 4m19.8s. The Norwegian is well outside the top 10 after the driveshaft problems on Friday and confirms that he's purely focused on getting into a good rhythm for the point-scoring Power Stage.
WRC
The running order is a reverse of the top runners from Saturday, with Valeriy Gorban next through in the Mini. The man to watch will be the seventh man to tackle the stage, Jari-Matti Latvala, who rates Rally GB as one of his favourites but was stymied by driveshaft problems on Friday. Mads Ostberg is just 7.2 seconds up the road in seventh, while even Dani Sordo's sixth place isn't looking totally safe if the Finn has a good start to the day.
Stopwatch
The stage is underway, and we've had our first runner through. Yazeed Al Rajhi completes SS17 in a time of 4m41.6s.
FV83.5
A crane is lifting the Lotus of Rene Binder from its unorthodoxed parking position at Turn 2, and the session has resumed.
Conditions this morning are cold and misty as we get set for SS17, Clocaenog. Our man David Evans talks us through the stage:

SS17/20 Clocaenog (4.78 miles)
Brings the crews right back to where the event started, with this stage running on parts of the shakedown stage – the final junction square right and the run down to the finish is identical. The nature of this stage is slightly different in to the roads in mid-Wales, but the surface in good condition and will provide an interesting start to the final day.
FV83.5
The session has been red-flagged just over seven minutes into the allotted half-hour. GP3 race winner Jack Aitken is fastest on a time of 1m28.418s, 0.288s ahead of race one winner Matevos Isaakyan.
FV83.5
Three-time 2016 race winner Roy Nissany will be aiming to get back to form in race two. The Lotus racer has struggled with a mixture of issues throughout the weekend, and could only manage a distant eighth in race one.
Information
The recovering Latvala has Mads Ostberg’s seventh place in his sights today – here’s how the top ten in the leaderboard stand.

Overall classification:
1 Ogier 2h43m25.3s
2 Tanak +33.8s
3 Neuville +1m34.5s
4 Paddon +1m47.1s
5 Meeke +2m29.5s
6 Sordo +3m36.0s
7 Ostberg +4m15.0s
8 Latvala +4m22.2s
9 Lefebvre +6m52.7s
10 Camilli +7m35.6s
FV83.5
Qualifying for Sunday's second and final Formula V8 3.5 race of the weekend at Jerez has started. After the dramatic clash between Tom Dillmann and Louis Deletraz, the top-two drivers in the title race, on Saturday, the top of the championship table has tightened up.

SMP Racing's Matthieu Vaxiviere was visibly distraught at losing out on victory in race one by running off the road late in the race, and the 10-point difference between his likely win and eventual third place was costly. Vaxiviere could have moved into third in the standings, one point behind the consistent Aurelien Panis.
WRC
We turn our attentions now to the final day of action from the Welsh forests of Rally GB, where newly-crowned WRC champion Sebastian Ogier will hope to manage his 33.8-second gap back to Ott Tanak and confirm his fourth win in a row.

All three VWs were affected by driveshaft problems on Friday, but unlike team-mates Andreas Mikkelsen and Jari-Matti Latvala, Ogier got away with it and ended the day with 37.3s in hand over Tanak after the Estonian suffered a puncture. Tanak responded on Saturday, winning four stages, but faces an uphill battle to unseat Ogier from the top spot.

Mikkelsen’s problems means Thierry Neuville could be confirmed in second in points if he remains in third place. The Belgian currently runs 12.6s ahead of Hyundai team-mate Hayden Paddon, a repeat of their battle two weeks ago in Catalunya.

Kris Meeke had held the position briefly on Friday, but the Northern Irishman was unable to match the pace of the leading runners and slipped to an isolated fifth. However, worse was to befall Citroen team-mate Craig Breen, who rolled out of the rally on the second attempt at Myherin.
Rossi finds Dovizioso on the cooldown lap for what will have been a heartfelt congratulations.
You'll find few people in the paddock who'll begrudge Dovizioso this win. He's a quality rider and gentleman.
That is Ducati's second win of the season, Iannone having ended its six-year drought in Austria in August.
Marquez got back up to 11th in the closing laps.
Barbera takes fourth ahead of Avintia team-mate Baz, while Vinales is sixth ahead of Vinales, Bautista, Miller, Pol Espargaro and Petrucci.

By: Matt Beer

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