By Martin Walsh
An aquaplaning slide on the day’s final stage saw Tyrone’s Kris Meeke (Toyota Yaris WRC) relinquish his day-long lead in Wales Rally GB. Overnight he held third just 3.6 seconds behind team mate Ott Tanak and just two 10ths of a second off second- placed Sebastien Ogier (Citroen WRC).
Craig Breen (Hyundai) ended the day in sixth.
Meeke was top of the leaderboard through the morning’s four stages. A six-second lead over Thierry Neuville (Hyundai) could have been more were it not for a spin at a hairpin on the fourth stage, the margin after S.S. 2 was 9.2 seconds.
The chasing pack was ever changing. Neuville in second at the Llandudno service was followed by Tanak, who was just three 10ths of a second behind. Ogier held fourth while Breen, who survived a moment on S.S. 4, got a notional time for the next stage that was cancelled due to irresponsible behaviour of some spectators. Less than 10 seconds covered the top six but not Elfyn Evans (Fiesta WRC), who lost time with suspension damage.
Ogier closed to within 1.5 seconds of Meeke, whose team mate Jari Matti Latvala crashed on stage seven. Meeke lost the lead when he aquaplaned on SS 10.