Oliver Solberg and Sébastien Ogier are neck-and-neck in the Safari Rally Kenya, with just one second separating them after day two. Solberg currently leads with a time of 1h33m50.2s, while Ogier is hot on his heels in second place, having reduced the deficit from 1m05.1s to just 1 second.
Ogier had a remarkable day, winning stages and closing the gap with Solberg, who had a small overshoot and tyre damage issues. Elfyn Evans is in third place, 20.5 seconds behind the leaders. Sami Pajari impressed with four stage wins, despite a 20-second penalty, and is in fourth place.
After the day, Ogier said that, “I think I can be very happy with today, starting with a deficit of more than a minute and being only one second from the lead tonight. Of course, we always believed that we could come back after last night, but it felt like a long shot even here in Kenya. Now it’s all very open, so let’s see. I think we are all expecting that tomorrow is the biggest day of the rally with three very demanding stages, so many things can still happen, but we’ll try to keep the same approach and a strong rhythm.”
“Today the goal was to try to be clean and keep a similar pace to Elfyn. This afternoon was so rocky, and for my first time in the car in these conditions it isn’t easy. We probably lost half our lead from being careful, and half the lead from the tyre damage in SS8. That was unfortunate but a lead is a lead and I have to be happy with that. Seb has been incredible today, probably taking more risks, but there’s such a long way to go and to be one second in front is better than two minutes behind,” started Solberg
The rally is far from over, with Saturday’s stages expected to be challenging, featuring three demanding stages around Lake Elmenteita. The competition is heating up, and anything can happen!
