WRC Safari: Rovanperä holds lead after challenging Saturday morning stages

Kalle Rovanperä continues to lead the World Rally Championship (WRC) Safari rally after steering clear of trouble on the third day of action as cars took the morning loop of Soysambu, Elementaita and Sleep Warriors. 

Kalle fnished the stages in third in the SS9 in Soysambu, finishing 6.3 seconds behind stage winner Elfyn Evans, sixth in Elementaita where he was 5.3 seconds slower than stage winner Thierry Neuville and again second behind Neuville in Sleeping Warrior, where he was 2.2 seconds slower. 

His lead, however, grew to 19.4 seconds after SS10 and he leads the standings ahead of Evans and Takamoto Katsuta who is 39.9 seconds adrift, having started the day in second place. 

“I just tried to be careful and the time is not too bad,” Rovanperä said after the morning session.

Neuville who was fastest on the last two stages managed to close to 7.4s behind Katsuta, despite having a rear-right puncture for the last couple of miles.

But both Katsuta and Evans had soft tires of their own. While Katsuta dropped 17s to Neuville to begin to fall into his clutches, Evans only shipped 6.6s.

“We did have a puncture at the end but realistically I do not think it cost us too much. I think we were a bit careful over this really rough part but as you can see we still got a puncture so it is difficult to judge the speed," offered Evans.

Sébastien Loeb had a slightly more difficult time on Sleeping Warrior compared to the rest of his morning, as both he and co-driver Isabelle Galmiche suffered from dust infiltrating his cockpit and then an encounter with the local wildlife.

"It is coming in from the doors all the time, and each corner. It is difficult to breathe and for her [Galmiche] it is difficult to speak," offered Loeb who retired on Friday.