Day 1
In this single stage shootout, Ott Tanak set the pace in the opening super special stage to claim an early World Rally Championship Safari Rally lead over Toyota’s Sebastien Ogier.
The 70th anniversary Safari Rally kicked off with a 4.48km head-to-head super special stage, lined by thousands of fans in the centre of Nairobi.
Tanak won his duel with Toyota’s Elfyn Evans by 3.3s with his effort emerging the fastest once all the head-to-heads were completed.
Day 2
Ogier showed his rivals a clean pair of heels on the opening day of action and had established a double-digit lead just three special stages into this seventh round of the FIA World Rally Championship.
A hybrid unit fault hindered the eight-time world champion late in the morning, however, slicing his buffer to just 2.5sec over team-mate Kalle Rovanperä before the midday service in Naivasha.
But that failed to deter Ogier, who gambled by carrying only one spare wheel aboard his Toyota GR Yaris for the repeated afternoon loop. Those weight-saving tactics clearly worked wonders as he romped to a hat-trick of benchmark stage times, ending the day 22.8sec clear of Rovanperä at the sharp end of a Toyota 1-2-3.
Thierry Neuville had been Hyundai’s leading light for much of the day but the Belgian retired in the penultimate test when a heavy compression destroyed the front-left suspension on his i20 N.
M-Sport Ford drivers Ott Tänak and Pierre-Louis Loubet had a day to forget. Both lay several minutes back from the lead in seventh and eighth overall after carrying out mid-stage wheel changes.
Day 3
Kalle Rovanpera has almost halved the deficit to Safari Rally Kenya leader Sebastien Ogier after starring when heavy rain caused chaos on Saturday afternoon on what was to be a dominant day for the Japanese outfit.
Eight-time world champion Ogier started Saturday with a 22.8s lead and the Toyota driver went on to stamp his authority on the event in the afternoon.
However, heavy rain arrived during the day’s final stage, which allowed Rovanpera to cut Ogier’s lead to 16.7s ahead of Sunday’s final six stages.
Toyota’s Elfyn Evans ended the day 2m23.3s down on Rovanpera in third after leapfrogging team-mate Takamoto Katsuta in the tricky wet conditions in stage 13. Dani Sordo led Hyundai’s charge in fifth.
M-Sport’s Ott Tanak and Pierre-Louis Loubet managed to survive to hold onto sixth and seventh overall, while Thierry Neuville has recovered to ninth after his Friday retirement behind WRC2 leader Kajetan Kajetanowicz.
Day 4
Ogier & Rovanpera continued an enthralling head-to-head as championship leader Rovanpera applied pressure on long time leader Ogier with three stages remaining.
Elfyn Evans remained on course to claim the final podium position. Ogier slid wide in deep sand at a right-hander and clipped a tree which removed the entire spoiler and tailgate.
Despite the damage, he blitzed the 18.33km test to beat Rovanpera by 8.6s to extend his lead back out to 17.2s.
As each stage went by Rovanpera managed to gain time off from his teammate but it wasn’t enough as Sebastien Ogier held his nerve to beat Rovanpera to win Safari Rally Kenya following a tense finish to the World Rally Championship’s most gruelling event.
Elfyn Evans and Takamoto Katsuta finished third and fourth to mirror the 1-2-3-4 Toyota scored at the event last year.
Dani Sordo led Hyundai’s charge to finish fifth. Tanak sixth ahead of team-mate Pierre-Louis Loubet. Have needed to retire at the end of Day 2, Neuville managed to recover towards an eight place finish.
However Neuville was then disqualified from the rally after a person connected with him travelled on two stages after reconnaissance without authorisation which meant losing his eight place.
The top 10 was completed by leading WRC2 runners Kajetan Kajetanowicz, Oliver Solberg & Martin Prokop.
