Top 15 classification from Rall🙈y Italia Sard🐎egna after SS9

Sebastien Ogier has charged inꦯto a useful lead at the end of Friday’s action♔ at Rally Italia Sardegna as previous leader Andreas Mikkelsen was forced to retire with a gearbox issue.

After the morning loop Hyundai’s Mikkelsen headed up the classification but a storming performance by Ogier on SS6 saw the M-Sport Ford driver&nbs✃p;win the stage and bolt into an overall lead. One stage later Mikkelsen’s rally was wrecked by a gearbox problem which forced him to retire from the event.

World Rally Championship leader Neuville has become Ogier’s closest challenger but e🌱nds the day 18.9 seconds off the M-Sport Ford driver.

I൩n a heavy rate of attrition both M-Sport’s Teemu Suninen and Toyota’s Ott Tanak retired on SS9, with the Finn crashing out while the Estonian suꦛffering extensive cooling damage after a jump, which saw the rest of the order promoted up two places in the classification.

Toyota’s Jari-Matti Latvala 💞has moved up to the꧑ final podium spot, over 18 seconds behind Neuville, with teammate Esapekka Lappi in fourth just 4.4 seconds back.

Lead Citroen ⭕driver Mads Ostberg now sits fifth narrowly ahead of Hyundai’s Hayden Paddon by 3.2s with Craig Bꩲreen in seventh.

Steph💦ane Lefebvre has taken over the lead of the WRC2 class for Citroen and holds a 14-second advantage on Skoda’s Jan Kopecky while Hyundai driver Ni🐼colas Ciamin rounds out the top 10 in the overall classification.

Earlier in the day Elfyn🌺 Evans suffered a disaster start to his Rally Italia Sa🌼rdegna when he sustained a broken steering arm which needed replacing, costing the M-Sport Ford driver 13 minutes on his rivals.