Gravel stage with a mixed special on Friday

14/10/2016

Ott Tänak/Raigo Mölder (Ford) opened the 52 RallyRACC leaderboard as they capitalised on the rain having eased off a bit as they raced the inaugural short street stage in Barcelona. The first day of the rally proper starts today with three special stages which will be run run twice, featuring the gravel Caseres (12.50 km) and Bot (6.50 km) sections, plus the Terra Alta SS. The 38.5 kms of Terra Alta make it the longest special stage in this event, and it is well known for shifting from gravel to tramac up to five times.

Besides, the cars will not go back to PortAventura World service park between the two loops. There will merely be a tyre fitting zone in Ascó at 13.16 hours, once the first loop is completed. After 386.26 kms overall - 115.90 of which will be timed- the cars will be back in PortAventura World late in the afternoon. Starting at 17.31 hours, the teams will have one hour and 15 minutes to set up the cars for the remaining tarmac stages on Saturday and Sunday. The RallyRACC Catalunya-COSTA DAURADA is the only mixed surface event in the world championship calendar.

Provisional standings after Day 1, 52 RallyRACC
1 - Ott Tänak/Raigo Mölder (Ford Fiesta RS WRC), 3'47''6
2 - Lorenzo Bertelli/Simone Scattolin (Ford Fiesta RS WRC), +2''7
3 - Sébastien Ogier/Julien Ingrassia (Volkswagen Polo R WRC), + 3''5
4 - Jan Kopecký/Pavel Dresler (Skoda Fabia R5), + 5''0
5 - Kris Meeke/Paul Nagle (Citroën DS3 WRC), + 5''2
6 - Craig Breen/Scott Martin (Citroën DS3 WRC) +5''2
7 - Thierry Neuville/Nicolas Gilsoul (Hyundai i20 WRC), + 5''7
8 - Andreas Mikkelsen/Anders Jaeger (Volkswagen Polo R WRC), + 5''8
9 - Mads Østberg/Ola Fløene (Ford Fiesta RS WRC), + 6''1
10 - Hayden Paddon/John Kennard (Hyundai i20 WRC), +6''4
11 - Daniel Sordo/Marc Martí (Hyundai i20 WRC), +7''0