Motorsport: Elfyn Evans takes an early lead at the Rallye Monte Carlo

RALLYE MONTE CARLO: Sebastien Ogier/Vincent Landais (Toyota Gazoo Racing WRT) currently sit in third place with Welsh ace Elfyn Evans (Toyota Yaris Rally1) leading the way. Pic: Jaanus Ree, Red Bull Content Pool

Welsh ace Elfyn Evans (Toyota Yaris Rally1) took the early lead through the opening pair of stages of Rallye Monte Carlo, the curtain raiser in this season’s thirteen round World Rally Championship. Two stage wins resulted in an overnight advantage of 15.1s over the Hyundai i20 Rally1 of Belgian Thierry Neuville with nine-time Monte champion Sebastien Ogier (Toyota Yaris Rally1) 6.5s further behind in third.

Evans had the honour of posting the fastest stage time on Thursday night’s opening stage, the brakes discs on his Toyota Yaris glowing at the stage finish as he benefitted from the clean road that had a high level of grip. Hyundai returnee Ott Tanak had issues with a sticking throttle during the mid-stage, finishing the 21.01km Thoard - Saint-Geniez stage 5.2s behind Evans. Thierry Neuville (Hyundai) remarked that he wasn’t very cautious but the tyres were moving about. Ogier (Toyota Yaris) occupied fourth place - 9.8s off the lead.