[caption id="attachment_6436" align="alignright" width="950"] Ogier after taking the lead on Friday. Photo: FIA[/caption]

Corsica, April 6: After the repeated afternoon stages on the opening day of the 2018 Tour de Corse, Sebastien Ogier has extended his advantage and now heads Thierry Neuville by 33.6 seconds on Friday.

The Frenchman won all but one of the day’s four stages and has a comfortable lead over his nearest Championship rival as the crews head into the longest day of the rally on Saturday. The fight behind the second-placed Belgian is however intense with Kris Meeke just 5.1 seconds further adrift in third and Ott Tanak 5.5 more seconds behind in fourth.

Ogier has reigned supreme and has had a virtually totally trouble-free run and was able to start pulling out a clear advantage when Sebastien Loeb retired after going off the road this morning.

Neuville, third going into the afternoon stages, was able to move ahead of Kris Meeke in the first of the repeated tests, second fastest through the long 49 kilometre stage aiding his charge. He maintained position through the final stage, pushing hard to stay ahead of a chasing Meeke.

The Northern Irish driver once again suffered with a faulty intercom this afternoon but was happy with his day in the C3 WRC. Tanak heads Toyota’s challenge in fourth, the Estonian admitting he was playing with a few settings in his first outing in the Yaris WRC on asphalt.

Toyota team-mate Esapekka Lappi has upped the pace this afternoon and had a great final stage, taking the fastest time in his first drive in a World Rally Car in Corsica. He is fifth albeit nearly 30 seconds adrift of Tanak.

Behind the Finn, there is a big battle with four other drivers; Elfyn Evans is chasing hard and only three-tenths of a second behind Lappi, Dani Sordo sits a further six-tenths of a second away and previous Tour de Corse winner Jari-Matti Latvala is eighth and again within striking distance of his rivals. Andreas Mikkelsen is a close ninth and Bryan Bouffier rounds off the top 10.

In the FIA WRC 2 Championship category, the fight is between Jan Kopecky and Yohan Bonato, the rivals split by 20.8 seconds at the end of a long day of competition in the mountains. The FIA Junior WRC Championship is headed by Terry Folb, the Frenchman 10.9 seconds ahead of Jean-Baptiste Franceschi.

Tour de Corse – Unofficial classification after Section 2

1

Sebastien Ogier/Julien Ingrassia

Ford Fiesta WRC

1hr 19min 39.0sec

2

Thierry Neuville / Nicolas Gilsoul

Hyundai i20 Coupe WRC

1hr 20min 12.6sec

3

Kris Meeke / Paul Nagle

Citroen C3 WRC

1hr 20min 17.7sec

4

Ott Tanak / Martin Jarveoja

Toyota Yaris WRC

1hr 20min 23.2sec

5

Esapekka Lappi / Janne Ferm

Toyota Yaris WRC

1hr 20min 52.5sec

6

Elfyn Evans / Phil Mills

Ford Fiesta WRC

1hr 20min 52.8sec

7

Dani Sordo / Carlos del Barrio

Hyundai i20 Couple WRC

1hr 20min 53.4sec

8

Jari-Matti Latvala / Miikka Anttila

Toyota Yaris WRC

1hr 21min 04.0sec

9

Andreas Mikkelsen / Anders Jæger

Hyundai i20 WRC

1hr 21min 08.2sec

10

Bryan Bouffier / Xavier Panseri

Ford Fiesta WRC

1hr 21min 23.8sec