Tom ‘consistent’ Kristensson leads the FIA Junior WRC field by 24.2 seconds as the championship flies on Rally Finland.
The penultimate round of the FIA Junior WRC Championship kicked off with a Super Special Stage on Harju with Julius Tannert taking the first stage win.
In total, six different drivers have taken stage wins so far on FIA Junior WRC’s Rally Finland with Kristensson taking four stages wins – and crucially four stage points.
Tom Kristensson emerged the man to beat on Friday’s speed tests, claiming the fastest time on the opening stage of the day, going 11.5 seconds faster than Dennis Rådström to create a solid foundation to build his lead on throughout the day.
Eyebrows raised as 17-year old Sami Pajari, AKK Sport’s Flying Finn Future Star Award winner, claimed his maiden FIA Junior WRC stage win on SS3. Jan Solans would record his first stage win of the day on SS4 with Romanian Raul Badiu just 2.5 seconds shy of his maiden FIA Junior WRC stage point.
Kristensson struck back on SS5 as Solans could only muster seventh, 4.7 seconds adrift of the Swede. Badiu was even closer to a stage win this time, just 0.3 seconds off the fastest time in his Pirelli-shod M-Sport Fiesta R2T.
Enrico Oldrati, fighting for a top-ten result, rolled on SS5 but was able to get back on four wheels and reach the end of the stage thanks to the help of some locals.
Badiu looked set to finally take his first stage win of his career, 2.5 seconds up at the halfway mark of the relatively short SS6 until disaster struck. The Romanian had a hard crash and was taken to hospital, more information will be made available at a later time.
After the morning loop, Dennis Rådström put himself in contention for victory on the rally, claiming his first stage win after posting a flurry of top-five times in the morning loop. Rådström sits third after Friday’s running, 28.0 seconds adrift of leader Kristensson.
Over the next three stages, Solans would claim two stage wins as Kristensson claimed his only stage win of the afternoon loop on SS9 but made a valuable 7.4 seconds up over Solans who could only manage fifth.
The final stage of the day saw a return to Harju for the second Super Special Stage of Rally Finland. The short 2.31 km stage saw Latvian Martins Sesks take his first stage win since Rally Sweden after posting multiple top-five times throughout the day.
Tom Kristensson said: « The rally is going extremely well, we have tried our best to avoid mistakes and punctures and it went really well. When I was feeling more confident and spotting possibilities on stages when the surface was good, we went for it. I am more comfortable with this rally for sure and that’s the reason why I am that confident that I can do these times. It’s going really well but going with control which is just fine. »
RALLY FINLAND CLASSIFICATION, SECTION ONE, TWO AND THREE TWO: 1.Tom Kristensson / Henrik Appelskog 01:14:21.9 2. Jan Solans / Mauro Barreiro + 00:24.2 3. Dennis Rådström / Johan Johansson + 00:28.0 4. Roland Poom / Ken Jarveoja + 00:42.6 5. Martins Sesks / Andris Malnieks+ 00:54.4 6. Sami Pajari / Antti Haapala + 00:57.0 7. Aleksi Royhkio / Ville Mannisenmaki + 01:41.0 8. Julius Tannert / Jürgen Heigl + 03:05.2 9. Fabrizio Zaldivar / Fernando Mussano + 03:58.3 10. Sean Johnston / Alex Kihurani + 05:45.2 11. Nico Knacker / Michael Wenzel + 06:58.2 12. Enrico Oldrati / Elia de Guio + 10:44.0 RETIRED: Raul Badiu / Gabriel Lazar Tom Williams / Phil Hall
Press release FIA Junior WRC
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