Volkswagen Motorsport driver Sebastien Ogier took a clean sweep this afternoon on the final stage of the 2013 Vodafone Rally de Portugal, winning the Power Stage and the event outright, his third win in Portugal in four years. Citroen Total Abu Dhabi WRT’s Mikko Hirvonen took second place and Ogier’s team-mate Jari Matti Latvala was third after a weekend of excellent action and drama on the Portuguese stages.
There was a resurgence of various forms on the final afternoon of the event. Mads Ostberg, running fourth on the road after crashing out of the first day, set the pace, going through the first three of the stages fastest and hinting at what might have been had he not retired on day one.
Indeed, he stood on the top step of the Power Stage podium until Ogier, who had previously said he would not be pushing for extra points, came through to complete the stage 3.3s faster and claim the additional three points. Ostberg would take two though, with Latvala taking the last, single extra point.
Ostberg’s performance had also elevated him back to well within the points and on the last stage he was able to pass both Khalid Al Qassimi in the Citroen DS3 WRC and Esapekka Lappi in the first of the WRC2 cars, to finish the event in eighth place – not bad considering he was 56th at the end of the first day with Rally2 penalties.
Latvala had held a solid second place to Ogier throughout the event and only dropped to third when he suffered a broken driveshaft on the first stage of the last day. This elevated Mikko Hirvonen to second place, which he held until the end of the event, completing just under a minute behind Ogier and three minutes ahead of Latvala.
Fourth place went to Evgeny Novikov, who complained of a lack of pace throughout the event, although he had no idea why. In fifth place was Nasser Al Attiyah, who was clearly enjoying the conditions and was able to adjust his speed to a charging Andreas Mikkelsel behind, in the third VW PoloR WRC.
Mikkelsen was driving a World Rally Car for the first time in several years and although was on a learning exercise, put in respectable times. He found that his pace notes contained far too much information and it was impossible for his new co-driver, Mikko Markkula to deliver at the greater speeds of the WRC compared to the S2000 he drove previously.
In the WRC2 category, Esapekka Lappi claimed a well-deserved win, having driven a completely dominant event, winning the first ten stages to hold a four-minute lead by the end of the second day. He managed his pace to avoid any problems and by the end of the event, had a winning margin of 11m36.5s. Second was Robert Barrable, on his first WRC event in the Fiesta S2000 and enjoying a largely error-free run, with the exception of a puncture on the second day. Third was German Sepp Wiegand who lost time on the final day when he crashed into a bridge and his gearbox would not select gears.
In WRC3, Citroen DS3 development driver Bryan Bouffier took a convincing win, after a solid performance which avoided many of the mistakes and problems experienced by others. He finished the event more than 10 minutes ahead of second-placed Sebastien Chardonnay, on the first round of the Citroen Top Driver series.