McErlean and Treacy finish sixth in Paraguay
Josh McErlean/Eoin Treacy (Ford Puma Rally1) finished sixth in Euno Rally del Paraguay, round eleven of the World Rally Championship. Picture: M-Sport Ford. .
The Kilrea/Killeagh partnership of Josh McErlean/Eoin Treacy (Ford Puma Rally1) took a record-equalling WRC finish with sixth place in Euno Rally del Paraguay that provided Finland's Sami Pajari (Toyota GR Yaris Rally1) with a hat-trick of WRC wins to close within 20 points of Welsh team mate and championship leader Elfyn Evans.
It proved to be an unfortunate outing for the Irish crew of Jon Armstrong/Shane Byrne, who retired their Ford Puma Rally1 from seventh place after completing SS20 where an impact with a bank ripped off much of the rear left suspension system.
Saturday's second leg was somewhat a tale of the unexpected and while a storm lashed the service park at Encarnacion blowing down some of the temporary structures, the forecast for rain out on the stages never really materialised. Rally leader Pajari began the day with an 11.9s lead over Paddon, he increased that on the first three stages although on the third (SS11) he ran into a ditch that ripped the rear wing from his Toyota. On the stage that followed he lost time on the faster sections due to the missing aerodynamic component and arrived at the service park with a 22.8s lead.
Second placed Paddon couldn't repeat Friday's form "I’m just struggling for rhythm at the moment. It is not gelling like yesterday. There is still a long way to go, so I just need to reset.” His French team mate Adrien Fourmaux was on a charge and while he remained fourth, he had cut an overnight deficit of 55s to championship leader Elfyn Evans to 31.8s, the latter taking no risks.
Anticipating rain, several crews had opted to soften their cars - Toyota and M-Sport Ford went further by fitting snorkels to their cars, however, it remained mostly dry.
McErlean (fifth) struggled with the soft set-up, he had a brief off on the morning's opening stage and overshot a junction on the next.
Pajari ended the day 24.1s clear of Paddon with third placed as Evans admitting he was too cautious in places but had no answer to Fourmaux's pace. "Clearly he doesn't care about the rough. There's always more risk, but you have to get to the end of the rally."
Overnight, Fourmaux was only 3.3s behind - a gain of 51.7s over the day's nine stages.
On the day's final stage McErlean lost fourth place to Oliver Solberg (Toyota GR Yaris Rally1) when he slid wide and clattered an advertising hoarding and dropped 6.3s behind Solberg. McErlean explained what happened. "We just slid wide, couldn't get any traction to get it turned." Elsewhere, McErlean's team mate Jon Armstrong climbed from fourteenth to eighth, nailing a top three finish on SS12.
On yesterday's final leg Pajari took his third win in a row to move to within twenty points of championship leader Evans, who was fourth on the event.
McErlean had to stop and make temporary repairs using a spanner as a transmission link after he hit trouble on the day's second stage (SS19). His team mate Armstrong had a disastrous SS20 when he ran wide and hit a bank that damaged the rear left of his Puma - finishing the stage with the left wheel hanging off his Ford Puma, he retired after the stage finish.
"I knew there was quite a bit of damage, it's eve pulled the damper out of its mount, really frustrated because we didn't have too much to fight for. We're back in seventh, which would be a good position for us. We're really struggling to get a clean finish at the moment, so we need to regroup, go to Chile and see if we can have a clean rally."
The penultimate stage was cancelled after Japan's Takamoto Katsuta and Fintona's Aaron Johnston crashed with their Toyota landing on its side and blocking the stage, both were uninjured.
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