Armstrong leads after Juniors deliver more excitement: Junior WRC

Zagreb, 24 April 2021: Saturday took off from where Friday finished with two Juniors departing the classification early, on the first stage of the day.
 
Romanian Raul Baidu, after two stage wins on Friday, ended his Saturday prematurely by damaging a wheel, forcing him to retire for the day.
 
Robert Virves joined Badiu, after finding some pace in his Fiesta Rally4 a series of mistakes followed, resulting in the young Estonian depositing a wheel on the stage. He returned his three-wheeled car to service to be repaired for Sunday’s action.
 
Lauri Joona came close to joining the pair of retirees on stage nine too but held it together after turning in too early on a hairpin, pitching his car and almost rolling. The Finn was able to regroup and became a strong contender in the fight for the lead later that day.
 
Martin Koci took the SS9 stage win by the narrowest of margins, beating Martins Sesks by just 1.4s, extending his lead over Joona.
 
Northern Irishman Jon Armstrong responded on the following stage to take his maiden Junior WRC stage win, narrowly denying Koci of top stage honours by three-tenths of a second. 
 
Armstrong and Joona began fighting over the runner up position in the Junior WRC classification from SS11 but also began to gradually chip away at Koci’s lead while Sami Pajari bagged a pair of stage wins following a brake issue to conclude the morning loop.
 
Stage 13 saw another stage point for Pajari, but Koci came away with the biggest loss as both Joona and Armstrong had slashed their deficit down by 10 seconds with Joona swapping places with Armstrong to take second.
 
Stage 14 saw a monumental shift in the focus on the fight for victory as Koci hit a rock, damaging his wheel, losing a costly 2 and a half minutes. Joona delivered a sub-par stage time while Armstrong capitalised, taking the stage win while seizing the lead.
 
Martins Sesks improved pace throughout the day, eventually fighting for stage wins towards the conclusion of Saturday’s stages, with the Latvian finding himself third by the time he returned to service in Zagreb.
 
At the end of Saturday Armstrong lead the Junior field by 22.5 seconds over Lauri Joona, with Sesks third, Koci fourth and William Creighton Fifth.
 
Pajari has stormed ahead leading the wolf stage win points with eight to his name so far, Badiu, Koci, and Armstrong are all tied for second with two and Joona fifth with one.
 
Maciek Woda, FIA Junior WRC Championship Manager: “Another exciting and unpredictable day in Junior WRC, what more can I say? Days like today, with such competitive stage action in identical machinery is what makes this Championship so exciting and unique. It’s unfortunate that Martin had a puncture as I believe we were set for a close battle between the top three tomorrow. I’m really interested and excited to see what Jon and Lauri do tomorrow. Jon hasn’t been in this position for a long time and Lauri is out of his comfort zone on asphalt so let’s see how it plays out tomorrow!”
 
Jon Armstrong, FIA Junior WRC Rally Leader: “Pretty good day for us in the morning the first stage was tricky, we had overheating brake issues but the second stage in the morning and the afternoon seemed really good for us. We had a big gap on the afternoon pass of that stage which propelled us into a really good position overall. We had no major issues apart from brake fade, we had a good day just doing our own thing getting faster and faster. We’re not too far away from anyone on every stage so we just need to keep doing what we’re doing and hope everything will go well.”