Thierry Neuville boosted his World Rally Championship hopes by provisionally claiming more than half of the points needed to secure the title, while rival Ott Tanak extended his Rally Japan lead.
Six points from the Japan season finale will secure a maiden title for Neuville, but that task was hanging in the balance after a turbo issue on Friday left the Hyundai driver in 15th position at the start of Saturday’s action.
Neuville delivered a faultless drive under pressure to climb to seventh [+7m43.7s], giving him four provisional points, across the day’s seven stages.
Tanak maintained his slim title hopes by picking up 18 points for topping Saturday’s standings by increasing his rally lead over Toyota’s Elfyn Evans to 38.0s. The advantage had been cut to 15.3s after stage 12 was cancelled after an unauthorised vehicle ventured onto the stage.
Toyota trimmed Hyundai's lead in the manufacturers' title battle to 11 points with Sebastien Ogier moving into third [+2m10.9s] ahead of M-Sport’s Adrien Fourmaux [+2m19.1s]. Takamoto Katsuta [+2m25.6s] ended the day in fifth, while M-Sport’s Gregoire Munster held a comfortable sixth [+3m07.1s].
After rejoining the rally on Saturday morning following Friday’s retirement, Hyundai’s Andreas Mikkelsen was absent from the afternoon loop as the team opted to save the car for Sunday’s stages.
Having witnessed Evans reduce his lead to 15.3s across the morning, Tanak issued a response at the start of the afternoon loop by winning stage 13 (Mt Kasagi, 16.47km).
The Hyundai driver didn’t have the balance he wished for on the hard tyre but was still able to claim his third stage-topping time of the rally to add 6.1s to his advantage on Evans, who was fighting understeer in his GR Yaris.
“I definitely tried to push [but] somehow I don’t have as good a balance as I did yesterday with hard tyre, but I felt comfortable. We need to keep going, Japan is never comfortable,” said Tanak.
The intense fight for third saw another change of position as Ogier helped Toyota to more manufacturers’ points by leapfrogging M-Sport’s Fourmaux.
“I was happy with pace. Seb is quicker. What else can I say? He is an eight-time world champion, he has to be quicker,” said Fourmaux, who trailed Ogier by 1.6s but remained ahead of Katsuta by four seconds.
Neuville’s recovery continued despite nursing a small brake issue. The championship leader was however able to close to within 0.3s of eighth place held by WRC2 runner Sami Pajari.
Neuville continued to manage a brake issue in stage 14 (Nenoue Kougen, 11.60km) but it didn’t stop the Hyundai driver from topping the timesheets, sharing the fastest time with Ogier. The effort helped Neuville overhaul Pajari for eighth spot and provisionally secure that vital extra point he needs for his title hopes.
Tanak also kept his championship hopes alive by extending his lead over Evans by another 2.4s, as Evans felt he was unable to perform as he should on the hard tyre in the drier conditions.
After losing out to Ogier in the fight for third, Fourmaux pushed hard to hang on to fourth. The M-Sport driver achieved his goal but the margin over Katsuta was cut to 0.2s, but he fought back through the relentless ribbon of corners that made up stage 15 (Ena, 22.79km) to extend his advantage over the Toyota driver to 5.4s.
Meanwhile, Evans’ struggles continued as Tanak took 12.2s out of the Welshman to move into a 36.0s lead heading into the final stage - a run through the Toyota Stadium super special.
Neuville was able to find the 56s he needed to jump ahead of Nikolay Gryazin to claim seventh to slightly ease the pressure heading into Sunday.
Tanak ended the day by winning the final super special against Neuville in their head-to-head.
Gryazin held eighth overall to extend his dominant run in WRC2 victory battle. The Citroen driver held a 1m25.3s lead over Toyota WRC protege Sami Pajari, who will seal the WRC2 title if he can hold onto the second position through Sunday.
Five stages await the crews to complete the final day of the 2024 season.
