The second day of the 2018 Cyprus rally proved to be just as exciting as the first, with thrills and spills a-plenty for the fans who had gathered both in the centre of Nicosia for the mostly tarmac Super Special stage which was run early on Sunday morning, and on the fast gravel tests in the countryside.
Overnight race leader Juuso Nordgren survived the first two stages of the day but perhaps the pressure of heading the field by such a small margin began to tell mid-morning: he rolled his Škoda Fabia R5 on stage 9 and dropped down to fourth place. The error handed first place to Simos Galatariotis who was closely followed by Bruno Magalhaes and Nasser Al Attiyah, who both had their own agendas with the finish line in sight.
Magalhaes wanted the podium to move to the top of the ERC leaderboard after the demise of Alexey Lukyanuk, while Al Attiyah was hoping to rack up his sixth win on this event after a disastrous first day beset by punctures which saw him drop from first to fourth place on Saturday.
A disconsolate Nordgren explained “We had a long wait before the stage, then at the first corner, very slippery, I went wide there. It was a really amateur mistake with the cold tyres into the first corner.” Despite his indiscretion, he vowed to continue, but disaster struck on the very next stage when he had a head-on collision with a car belonging to a member of the public (which should not have been in a rally special stage). As a result, stage 11 was cancelled to try and get the entire race back on schedule.
The final two stages, at Layia and Lefkara – dubbed Golden Stages as prize money was up for grabs to the fastest overall crew, the best 2WD and the quickest Cypriot crew – were set for the final showdown. Galatariotis was hanging on to his lead, 12.7 seconds ahead of Magalhaes and 18.3 seconds in front of the charging Al Attiyah.
A blistering run at an average speed of over 76km/h through stage 12 gave the lead to the Qatari, with Galatariotis in second place, just 2.3 seconds behind, and Magalhaes third, 9.1 seconds behind the Cypriot. With the final stage at Lefkara almost 20 kilometres long it was clear that anything could happen: one mistake or turn of bad luck could turn the leaderboard upside down again.
And it did.
Al Attiyah stopped in the stage and suffered a slow puncture which cost him all of two minutes, and he dropped down to fourth again. Magalhaes clocked 8 seconds faster than Galatariotis over the stage, but it wasn’t enough to take the top spot: the Cypriot finished the rally just six tenths of a second ahead to claim his first victory on this tough event.
Hungary’s Norbert Herczig gained a podium and third overall after Al Attiyah fell back, with Orhan Avcioğlu finishing fifth, Vojtěch Štajf in sixth followed by David Botka, Von Thurn Und Taxis and Petros Panteli and Alexandros Tsouloftas completing the top ten.
The post Thrilling finale to Cyprus Rally appeared first on Cyprus Mail.
Read more → https://cyprus-mail.com/2018/06/17/thrilling-finale-to-cyprus-rally/
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