WRC Spain: Sordo, Latvala share lead after Ogier drama
Dani Sordo and Jari-Matti Latvala share the lead of the Rally of Spain after a dramatic second morning as overnight pacesetter Sebastien Ogier lost a minute with a puncture
New world champion Ogier began the day with an 8.8-second lead after topping each of Friday night's stages, and immediately settled into a steady, if unspectacular rhythm.
Despite admitting he was not concerned about the possibility of acting as a road-sweeper on Sunday's gravel stages, he never matched the pace of either Volkswagen team-mate Latvala or Citroen driver Sordo during the morning.
Ogier was still 6.5s ahead after the fifth stage, but suffered the left-front puncture midway through the morning's final timed run and fell to sixth, 48.6s adrift of the frontrunners.
With Latvala going fastest on that stage by half a second from Sordo, he was able to take a share of the lead.
M-Sport Ford driver Thierry Neuville continued to drop back, the Belgian saying that both his car's set-up and his pace notes needed examining as a way of improving his pace during the afternoon.
Citroen's Mikko Hirvonen closed on Neuville on the morning's first two stages, but dropped half a second on SS6, meaning the battle for what is now third is separated by 9.1s.
Fifth is Evgeny Novikov, who gained one place when VW's Andrea Mikkelsen clobbered a rock on SS4 and broke his rear suspension, and another when trouble struck Ogier. Mikkelsen will return under Rally2 rules on Sunday.
The intense battle behind them between Mads Ostberg and Hayden Paddon was broken up when the Kiwi hit a rock face on SS6 and broke both his right-front wheel and suspension.
Paddon's incident ensured he fell to ninth, 13.9s behind Ostberg and with Martin Prokop in between them.
Robert Kubica was the fastest WRC2 runner on all three stages and holds 10th overall, a minute and a half ahead of his nearest category rival, Elfyn Evans.
Leading positions after SS6: Pos Driver Team/Car Time/Gap 1. Dani Sordo Citroen 1h24m16.6s 2. Jari-Matti Latvala VW +0.0s 3. Thierry Neuville M-Sport Ford +31.4s 4. Mikko Hirvonen Citroen +40.5s 5. Evgeny Novikov M-Sport Ford +46.4s 6. Sebastien Ogier VW +46.8s 7. Mads Ostberg M-Sport Ford +1m59.2s 8. Martin Prokop Czech Ford +2m12.9s 9. Hayden Paddon M-Sport Ford +2m13.1s 10. Robert Kubica PH Citroen +2m55.4s*
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