Sebastien Ogier has won Rally Australia as Volkswagen secured the Manufacturers’ Championship with its very first 1-2-3.
It was a historic result for VW and all the more sweet after a nightmare weekend last time out on home soil in Germany. Indeed it was the 19th win for the Polo R WRC and the team’s sixth one-two of the season.
Ogier went into the final day with an 11.8 second advantage and while team-mate Jari-Matti Latvala did his best to maintain the pressure, the Frenchman was able to control the gap, winning SS16 and SS18, and eventually taking the spoils by 6.8 seconds.
“There was no better way to come back after Germany. It was so disappointing to offer the team so little at home, so to deliver the first Volkswagen 1-2-3 here is a great result,” Ogier told the official WRC site.
Ogier now increases his lead in the Drivers’ Championship from 44 points to 50 with three events to go in France, Spain and Britain.
“It has been a great fight, a really great fight. I enjoyed it a lot,” added Latvala, who was quickest in the event ending Power Stage, taking his third stage win of the day and his seventh of the event.
“But of course I am annoyed about Saturday’s wrong tyre choice – that is where I lost it.
“Overall though a good event – these are the sort of results I need to have if I am going to win the title myself one day.”
Latvala had led after Saturday morning’s opening loop, pulling out 4.1 seconds on Ogier. However in the afternoon he was left lamenting his tyre choice when the forecast rain failed to materialise. He concluded the second day more than 10 seconds back.
Meanwhile, Volkswagen Motorsport II pilot Andreas Mikkelsen ran well to take third, albeit more than a minute further adrift.
The Norwegian was involved in a tight fight with Kris Meeke for the final rostrum position on day two, but when the Ulsterman was handed a 61 second penalty on Saturday night for excessively cutting a corner in SS10, it effectively decided the matter.
Meeke, however, still put in another top drive, building on what he had done in the previous two events in Finland and Germany. He also lead for a time on Friday, taking the lead in SS3 and only losing it right at the end after the first of two runs through the short Hyundai super special stage.
“To be honest I think this is my strongest performance to date,” said the Citroen driver. “I feel I’m really getting closer to the other guys. Okay I still have work to do to catch them but I’m enjoying myself at the moment. We just need to keep it going.”
Behind, Mikko Hirvonen was fifth for the M-Sport World Rally Team and well he started the final day fractionally ahead of Meeke, in the end he finished 9.6 seconds back: “A good event for me. We couldn’t get the podium we wanted but still a good fight. I tried all I could to fight with Meeke today. Not too bad,” he summarised.
Hayden Paddon was the top Hyundai driver in sixth, with team leader and Rallye Deutschland winner Thierry Neuville one spot back in seventh after hitting a stone near the start of SS5 on Friday and breaking the rear suspension. The Belgian lost almost 2 minutes as a result.
Crash.net columnist Elfyn Evans took eighth in his M-Sport Fiesta RS WRC with former F1 driver and team-mate Robert Kubica ninth.
Further back, Chris Atkinson managed tenth on his first outing in the WRC since Rally Mexico at the start of the season. The Australian gained a points’ position in the penultimate stage when Mads Ostberg hit trouble. The Norwegian had been on course for sixth, but ended up finishing down in 15th: “I didn’t hit anything. I don’t know what happened. My bad luck will never fucking end! It is unreal, absolutely unreal,” he stated.
In WRC2, Nasser Al-Attiyah took the victory, more than a minute up on Jari Ketomaa. Yuriy Protasov was third, with current WRC2 championship leader Lorenzo Bertelli fourth and Subhan Aksa fifth.
There were only two retirements, and both of those came on the final day, with Yazeed Al-Rajhi, who had been battling for the WRC2 win, suffering radiator damage in the opening test. Ott Tanak also retired, rolling it in the penultimate stage.
The 2014 FIA World Rally Championship now heads back to Europe, with Rallye de France-Alsace next up, running from October 3-5.
