[Speaking in the mid-day service] “This morning was hard, the stages are so tough. It’s a surface we haven’t seen before, and I didn’t feel comfortable with the car on it. It’s a very hard base, but there’s no grip. We drove the stages on the recce and knew they’d be slippery, but it’s even more unpredictable and slippery than I expected. We had a spin this morning and ran off the road once, but we brought it back to the service park ok and will make some changes to see if we can find more this afternoon.”
Urmo Aava [PH Sport-Citroen C4 WRC]:
"Maybe it is a clear road for me. It is very hard if you drift off the correct line."
Matthew Wilson [Stobart VK M-Sport Ford WRT]:
"Today has been a really good start to the rally and I’m starting to feel more comfortable on these tricky stages. Apart from having a couple of minor half spins which dropped us some time, it’s all went well today and I’m pleased with our performance. The stage times have been really consistent and the only changes we have made have been to adjust our lines over some difficult crests and this worked well for the second pass. We concentrated on preserving our tyres in the second loop as it’s really easy to run wide onto the loose gravel and drop some time."
[Speaking in the mid-day service] “The stages have been very slippery especially the last one and it didn’t seem to have cleaned as much as the others; there was a lot of loose gravel on top. We had a small spin and touched a small bridge but no damage and we didn’t loose much time. I feel we have had a really good start this morning and my notes are working well. The only thing we have changed is just a few lines over some tricky crests and we refined things slightly. But I’m happy so far.”
Henning Solberg [Stobart VK M-Sport Ford WRT]:
"We found things difficult this morning but it is a new rally and I just can’t jump in and be very fast from the start. The surface is difficult and I need to build up my confidence here and then in turn build up my speed during the rally. We made quite a few changes to the pacenotes and hopefully this will also help with my confidence. The conditions are tricky and it’s easy to make a mistake so I will continue to concentrate and push harder when I can. I have finished today in the points and without any problems so I’m happy with that."
