News

Wales Rally GB: Brynildsen still out front

23-Oct-2009

Eyvind Brynildsen continued to dominate the Production Car WRC field through this afternoon’s three stages on Rally GB.

The Norwegian Skoda driver repeated his fastest times on the Hafren and Myherin tests to build a lead of close to a minute over his closest rival, fellow Fabia S2000 driver Patrik Sandell.

Brynildsen’s good mood of the morning was mirrored when he arrived back in Cardiff this evening. He hadn’t been headed all day and the rally couldn’t have gone better. “I’m very happy!” said the P-WRC leader. “The car has just been perfect. I’m flying in those forests; this car is flying without wings - it’s amazing. I didn’t push so much in the second stage through the afternoon; we had a good lead which I’m trying to keep.”

Sandell was the only driver to score a fastest time in the afternoon, other than Brynildsen, but the Swede’s charge was slowed slightly in the final stage, when he lost the intercom and was unable to hear the vital pace note calls coming from his co-driver.

Sandell’s rise up the leaderboard came at the expense of Martin Prokop - the Czech driver was three tenths of a second behind at the end of the day. “The intercom problem was very frustrating,” said Sandell, “but the stage in Sweet Lamb was great - so much fun. I love the jumps and the watersplash, there were lots of people - great!”

Prokop had lost out to Sandell’s Skoda on all three afternoon stages and admitted he was struggling on the re-run tests. “It’s hard to keep up with the S2000 cars,” said Prokop. “I’m pushing as hard as I can. Everything is okay, but it’s tough.”

Japanese Toshi Arai was fourth in P-WRC overnight after a solid run in his Impreza. “It’s been quite difficult,” he said. “I don’t know these stages so well. The middle stage [Sweet Lamb] was very good. I’m still laughing after that!”

His fellow Subaru drivers Nasser Al-Attiyah and Patrik Flodin weren’t so fortunate, both retired from the first day on the re-run Hafren test. Flodin dropped out of the fight when he knocked a wheel off his Subaru, while Al-Attiyah slid off the road and got his stuck in a ditch.

[Source: WRC News]