WRC Rally Japan: Oliver Solberg turns up pressure on Elfyn Evans

Evans still leads, but Solberg’s morning pace has tightened the fight for victory

Oliver Solberg heaped pressure on Rally Japan leader Elfyn Evans as the battle to win the final asphalt round of the World Rally Championship season intensified.

Solberg quickly set his sights on catching Evans, whose 15.7s overnight lead over his Toyota team-mate was reduced to 10.6s.

Solberg produced stunning speed in the day’s opening test to win stage seven (Obara) by 3.2s from Evans, who struggled with the front end of his GR Yaris. Solberg, a winner on asphalt in Monte Carlo, could have gone even faster had he not made an error at a junction.

Evans was able to respond in stage eight (Ena) as the Welshman topped the times by 1.4s over Solberg – who chose to protect his tyres – to push his lead back out to 13.9s. But it was Solberg that had the final say on the morning loop as he claimed stage nine (Mt. Kasagi). The Swede was 2.3s quicker than third-placed Sébastien Ogier but more importantly was 3.3s faster than Evans.

“Today the others know the stages very well for many years [driving Rally1 cars]. Some corners are not perfect and then you can see on the splits that the others are catching but in other areas I feel very good. I was a little bit careful in the long one with my tyres, but I think it paid off in the last one,” said Solberg.

Elfyn Evans, Scott Martin, Toyota Gazoo Racing WRT Toyota GR Yaris Rally1

Photo by: Toyota Racing

“I think there is no point to push more but drive a bit cleaner and we can take a few tenths here and there.”

Evans described his morning as a bit “mixed”, revealing he struggled on the dirtier roads given the road order had been reversed from Friday.

“It has been a bit mixed and some moments in the car it felt good, but now on the dirt I didn’t have such a good feeling. The morning has been good. It is close with Oliver but we didn’t expect anything else. We will do some small changes on the car [at the midday tyre fitting zone] but nothing too major,” said Evans.

Sebastien Ogier, Vincent Landais, Toyota Gazoo Racing WRT Toyota GR Yaris Rally1

Photo by: Toyota Racing

Ogier’s hopes of challenging for victory began to slide in the opposite direction as the nine-time world champion was unable to find the speed to fight with Solberg and Evans. Sitting in third, Ogier ended the morning loop with the gap to the lead increasing to 20.1s.

“More importantly the gap to Elfyn got bigger so it is not going the way we would like, but at the moment we are not able to find more speed. We will keep trying but for sure it is not going in the right direction,” said Ogier.

“I think all weekend the combination of these temperatures and tyres is not really suiting me. I will try my best to fight it but it is difficult at the moment.”

While Ogier was struggling by his own high standards, Toyota was able to lock out the top five positions. Sami Pajari held fourth ahead of home hero Takamoto Katsuta, who managed to climb into fifth, 18.4s behind his team-mate.

Thierry Neuville, Martijn Wydaeghe, Hyundai World Rally Team Hyundai i20 N Rally1

Photo by: Hyundai

Hyundai’s Thierry Neuville slid down the order after struggling with understeer and balance issues with his i20 N. The 2024 world champion had surprised himself with his pace on Friday but in the dry conditions, and on the hard tyres, he couldn’t extract pace from his car.

Neuville dropped behind team-mate Adrien Fourmaux into seventh after losing the use of his handbrake in the final stage of the loop. A handbrake issue proved particularly troublesome given the twisty nature of the stages.