Sata Rally Açores: Day 3 review

Juho Hanninen moved to the top of the all time wins standings with victory on this week's Sata Rally Açores. Andreas Mikkelsen dropped to second after leading at the end of today's first stage. However, Hanninen showed why he is reigning Driver's Champion, taking 13.9 secs out of Mikkelsen over the 22Km stage. Mikkelsen finished the event trailing Hanninen by 42.3 secs.

“It’s been a good weekend and thanks to the team. We had three ŠKODAs on the podium so that’s a great result. We had a good fight with Andreas, especially yesterday and this victory feels very good.” said Hanninen.

Completing yet another Skoda podium lockout, Jan Kopecky inherited third after Peugeot's Bruno Magalhaes retired at the start of SS14, the rear differential support breaking left the rear differential nearly dragging on the ground. Kopecky 1 min 46 sec behind his flying team-mate.

Reigning French Rally Champion Bryan Bouffier took fourth at the finish. The Frenchman was hampered by running first on the road for all three days, but still remains in the title fight with his solid fourth place finish on his début on the event. Just behind Bouffier was former Junior World Champion Patrick Sandell. The Swede was hampered by a 1 min penalty yesterday for clocking into a time control early, but he took his first fastest stage time in the IRC by going fastest on the final stage.

From sixth down to ninth were the Group N runners, with run-away winner Ricardo Moura taking sixth, 3 mins 45 secs ahead of his nearest challenger, Vitor Lopez. Moura finishing over 6 mins behind overall rally leader Hanninen. Third in Group N was Vitor Pascoal, 6 mins 40 secs behind Moura. Taking ninth overall and fourth in Group N was Sérgio Silva in his Impreza.

Rounding out the Top 10 & taking 2WD honours was Paulo Maciel. The Portuguese driver took his Citroen Saxo to a 1 min 33.7 sec winning margin over his nearest challenger, and IRC 2WD Championship leader, Jean-Michal Raoux. Carlos Costa managed to take third in his Citroen C2 R2. He was over 5 mins behind Maciel. Harry Hunt retired again today after he beached his Citroen DS3 R3T on SS13.

Fumio Nutahara drove a fairly clean rally to finish in 11^th position in his Subaru Impreza R4. Toshi Arai, in the other Impreza R4, rejoined today after electrical problems put him out yesterday. The Japanese driver was under orders to drive as hard as he could today, but a puncture on SS14 put him well down the order.