German stage of the World Rally Championship was the first of the two races is completely asphalt outside the WRC calendar this year. Virtually all previous stages of the current world champion Sebastien Ogier had problems with clearing the track — he always started first and had an unfavorable starting position.
But that did not stop him to win in the past eight races five wins and two runner-up. In Germany — on asphalt — the first starting position is not a serious handicap, and Ogier from the start showed his true speed in comparison with rivals. It was a disaster...
As a result only the first section consisting of four special stages, two team-mate Sebastien Ogier and Jari-Matti Latvala led the race ahead of the nearest rival to him almost 16 seconds. And this was a rival pilot the second team Volkswagen Motorsport Andreas Mikkelsen and the rest of the participants were still on!
By the middle of the first day of Latvala even came in first place with a margin of one-tenth of a second from Ogier. But after the Frenchman inflated rate service and went into the lead. Friday evening Seb met a leader, and Jari-Matti departed from him for almost ten seconds. Mikkelsen has lost thirty-five seconds, and he was the last of those who managed to keep a minute gap.
Starting from the fourth position, which he held a pilot Hyundai Motorsport and the famous asphalt expert Dani Sordo, crews lost the leader of the race more than a minute.
Thierry Neuville closed the top-5, followed by day two pilots completed M-Sport Elfin Evans and Ott Tyanak, Hayden Peddon, Mads Ostberg and his debut at the wheel of Citroen DS3 WRC Stephane Lefebvre.
Notebooks losers season Kris Meeke and Robert Kubica noted the problems on the first day. The Irishman made a mistake under braking and went off the road. The return took him some time and plus the fact he had problems with the suspension of his Citroen DS3 WRC. As a result, he fell from the fourth position to the end of the day as much as twenty-fifth! Talk about a fight for points is not necessary.
Polyak is received before the start of a five-minute penalty for the replacement of the motor that advance puts an end to any dreams of a good result. But — as if that was not enough — on the penultimate day of the first SU Kubica flew into the vineyard, and slipped it through. This windshield covered with cracks, the driver simply could not see and had to stop in order to remove it. And without that not the best for his race was even worse...
But Robert had nothing to fear — he «privateers» and rides for your money and the money their sponsors. You can not say about Chris — a failure in Germany has become a regular drop in the cup manual factory team Citroen Racing. She is still not crowded, but it seems that things are moving in the dismissal of Mick from the French team.
Unlike previous years, the Rally Germany in 2015 was not much saturated struggle. All of the top ten overall standings after the first day successfully reached the finish of the race, the order within it has not changed very much. The first six retained its position as the ninth largest Mads Ostberg has managed in the course of the second and third days of the rally ahead of the holders of the seventh and eighth place Tyanaka Ott and Hayden Peddon.
By the end of the race leader Sebastien Ogier had become second lead over Jari-Matti Latvala in 23 seconds. The distance could be much larger, but the Frenchman has excluded any risk and allowed himself some special stages to finish in sixth and eighth times.
Rally Germany conquers Cebu when he spoke at Citroen. But driving a Volkswagen Polo R WRC, he has never won here does not. Therefore, before Ogier and the whole team was a clear objective — in whatever was to win a home race for the team. Here Sebastien did everything to fulfill it.
Crews Volkswagen Motorsport is not just triumphed in Germany — they occupied the whole podium! Latvala After a little less than two minutes (!) Behind Ogier finished Andreas Mikkelsen.
The dominance of the German team is best illustrated by the fact that of the 21 special stages crews Volkswagen won twenty! And he did it only Ogier (14 victories on the SS) and Latvala (six first places). And the only representative of the other teams who managed to win at least one special stage, Evans became Elfin.
Dani Sordo and Thierry Neuville finished Rally Germany in fourth and fifth places — Hyundai Motorsport crews left behind their rivals from the M-Sport and Citroen Racing.
Elfin Evans from M-Sport at the end of the race was sixth, followed by Mads Ostberg (Citroen), Ott Tyanak (M-Sport), Hayden Peddon (Hyundai) and Stephane Lefebvre (Citroen).
The next stage of the World Rally Championship kicks off on September 10 in Australia.
