Kalle Rovanpera recorded his 200th career World Rally Championship stage win on his way to extending his lead at Rally Latvia on Saturday morning.
The two-time world champion won three of the four morning gravel tests, including his milestone 200th, to increase his advantage to 34.8s.
That lead was over Toyota team-mate Sebastien Ogier, who managed to pip local star Martins Sesks to second across the loop.
Hyundai’s Ott Tanak charged from sixth overnight to fourth [+45.0s] ahead of M-Sport Ford’s Adrien Fourmaux [+1m06.3s] and Toyota’s Elfyn Evans [+1m14.3s].
Takamoto Katsuta started the day in fourth but a mistake on stage 12 demoted the Japanese to seventh [+1m35.5ss] in front of Hyundai’s championship leader Thierry Neuville [+2m14.4s], Esapekka Lappi [+2m43.7s] and Gregoire Munster [+2m51.8s].
Road cleaning was arguably an even bigger effect on Saturday with only one of the day’s eight stages repeated.
This was evident in the morning’s first 18.87km test Pilskalns, as times tumbled with more or less every pass.
Rally leader Rovanpera was granted the best road position which he duly made the most of, while adding further gloss. The Finn posted a blistering time despite carrying the extra weight of two spare wheels unlike his rally rivals Sesks and Ogier. Rovanpera chalked up his sixth stage win from nine test by 5.4s from Ogier.
Ogier felt he could have used the lines from his rivals more but his effort did close the gap to second-placed Sesks to 3.2s. Sesks continued to impress matching the fourth fastest time set by Katsuta.
“I was trying to be really clean but in some places I was still a bit cautious,” said Sesks. “We will just drive we are not that experienced to fight with guys like [Ogier and Rovnapera].”
Tanak claimed his i20 N was much more “positive” which was reflected in the stage times as the Estonian climbed ahead of Fourmaux into fifth overall by 6.3s, after posting the third fastest stage time, just a tenth slower than Ogier.
The other change of position came further down the order as Neuville, benefitting from team orders on Friday night that placed team-mate Lappi ahead of him on the road order. Neuville took advantage of slightly cleaner road conditions to jump in to eighth ahead of M-Sport’s Gregoire Munster. The gap to seventh-placed Evans was 38.8s.
“I was too careful, there was much more grip than I expected due to one car in front. I wasn’t using the line too much. Once car can make that much difference,” said Neuville following his Friday night outburst on road order rules.
Stage 10 [Snepele 17.52km] will be remembered as a milestone test for Rovanpera as the Finn’s charge continued, which unbeknown to him was his 200th career WRC stage win. The triumph extended his rally lead out to 29.2s.
"That's quite cool. If I would have known that [milestone was close] I would've been faster,” said Rovanpera on reaching 200 stage wins.
Behind, a cautious Sesks responded to Ogier in the fight for second by pipping the eight-time world champion Ogier by 0.3s.
The battle for fourth was close too as Katsuta hung on to the spot by 0.5s from a charging Tanak who was only two seconds slower than pacesetter Rovanpera.
Fourmaux was at a loss to explain why he was unable to replicate the pace he’d shown on Friday and came under pressure from Evans, who clawed time back to sit seven seconds adrift of Frenchman in sixth overall.
Rovanpera’s streak of five consecutive stage wins came to an end on stage 11 [Ivande 23.04km] as Tanak lit up the timing screens.
Tanak’s first fastest time of the event to date was enough to snatch fourth overall from Katsuta.
The leaderboard underwent another change with Ogier taking second from Sesks by 0.2s, despite surviving a wild moment. Ogier found himself completely crossed up in the test that resulted in his GR Yaris briefly going up on two wheels before the Frenchman somehow wrestled the car back on to the road. Ogier reached the stage end trailing leader Rovanpera by 33.4s.
The final stage of the loop [Vecpils 12.64km] wasn’t without drama either. Katsuta out-braked himself heading into a chicane which resulted in his GR Yaris finding a bank. Luckily, he was able to continue but had to fight a lack of power steering that dropped him from fourth to seventh overall.
There was no stopping Katsuta’s team-mate Rovanpera, who ended the loop in style by winning the fast and wide gravel test by 1.4s from Ogier.
Oliver Solberg maintained his WRC2 lead over Mikko Heikkila with Sami Pajari in third.
