Germany WRC: Tanak maintains healthy lead into final stages
Ott Tanak protected his lead over Andreas Mikkelsen on the first loop of Rally Germany's final day, as Sebastien Ogier lost touch with the leaders in third.
Photo by: Sutton Images
Though Citroen driver Mikkelsen was faster than Tanak's M-Sport Ford on both early Sunday stages and declared he wanted to keep the pressure on, he was only able to reduce the gap from 21.4 seconds to 18s.
But Mikkelsen did manage to drop Ogier, extending that gap from 8.2s to 19.3s as the world champion admitted he did not have enough confidence in his car to go flat-out with points at stake.
Ogier's WRC rival Thierry Neuville rejoined for leg three under Rally2 following his Saturday morning suspension breakage.
Neuville is focused on salvaging maximum bonus points from the powerstage, but he was only sixth-quickest on the first running of the St Wendeler Land stage where the extra score will be awarded later on.
Elfyn Evans overshot a junction on the day's opener, which allowed stage pacesetter Juho Hanninen to move up to fourth.
Evans is now fifth, but coming under pressure from Craig Breen, who is 7.1s behind.
Jari-Matti Latvala and Hayden Paddon remain seventh and eighth, with M-Sport guest driver Armin Kremer just ahead of his WRC2-leading teammate Eric Camilli in ninth.
Results after SS19:
| Pos. | Driver | Car | Time/Gap |
| 1 |  Ott Tanak |
M-Sport Ford | 2:44:33.0 |
| 2 |  Andreas Mikkelsen |
Citroen | +18.0 |
| 3 |  Sebastien Ogier |
M-Sport Ford | +37.3 |
| 4 |  Juho Hanninen |
Toyota | +1:50.4 |
| 5 |  Elfyn Evans |
M-Sport Ford | +2:03.5 |
| 6 |  Craig Breen |
Citroen | +2:10.6 |
| 7 | Jari-Matti Latvala |
Toyota | +4:06.7 |
| 8 |  Hayden Paddon |
Hyundai | +4:39.8 |
| 9 |  Armin Kremer |
M-Sport Ford | +9:45.1 |
| 10 | Eric Camilli |
M-Sport Ford | +9:49.2 |
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