The Latest Breaking News from Sebastien Ogier

The 41-year-old capped his 191st WRC start by coming through to finish third behind Hyundai team-mate Ott Tanak and Toyota’s Sebastien Ogier - the top two were separated by just by 0.2s.

Tanak became embroiled in an intense fight with overnight leader Sebastien Ogier (Toyota) across the morning’s rough gravel stages with the lead changing hands twice, before Tanak ended the loop with a 3.5s lead.

Toyota driver Katsuta, starting sixth on the road, produced a strong and consistent pace across Friday morning’s four stages to take a 2.9s lead over Neuville at the midday tyre fitting zone.

This weekend marks the start of the traditional gravel rally season welcoming the strongest Rally1 field of the season to date, comprising five previous Portugal winners.

The 2024 WRC season is as open as it comes with four different winners in as many rounds to commence the campaign. Championship leader Thierry Neuville kicked things off with victory in the season-opening Monte Carlo Rally, before Esapekka Lappi won in Sweden, Kalle Rovanpera in Kenya and finally Sebastien…

The Toyota driver has been among the most critical of the new points system and again brought the subject back into question after finishing second behind team-mate Sebastien Ogier.

The title rivals were locked in a titanic scrap across the day’s eight stages, which saw the lead change hands and the margin between the pair never exceeding five seconds, having started Saturday tied on overall times.

Neuville and Evans started the day tied for the lead after ending Friday on identical times, and the fiercely competitive battle continued across the morning’s four stages.

Hyundai’s Neuville and Toyota’s Evans couldn’t be split after 119.74 competitive stage kilometres, ending the day with identical overall times.