Ahead of the third day of Estonia's World Rally Championship, only 8.5 seconds separated Kalle Rovanperä and Irishman Craig Breen and many expected a rock-hard second battle on Saturday.
But Rovanperä killed the tension almost immediately.
Super fast Finn
Already on the first leg, the Finn extended his lead to 22.8 seconds and then continued in the same way for the rest of the day.
Ahead of Saturday's final stretch, the 1.64 kilometer short audience stretch in the capital Tartu, Rovanperä has a lead of 46.3 seconds to Breen.
Rovanperä realized he was almost driving
too
fast.
- I have slowed down a lot but the time is still good, so I need to slow down even more, Rovanperä said with a smile in the TV interview after the 15th leg.
Third is Thierry Neuville who has had a hard fight with seven-time world champion Sébastien Ogier.
Right now, the Belgian has the advantage of having 18.6 seconds on the Frenchman.
Kristensson femma
In WRC 2 is the Swede Tom Kristensson, with David Arhusiander as map reader five but is not really happy with his driving.
"It's really fun to drive here in Estonia on these fantastic roads, but they are challenging," Kristensson writes on social media.
Mikkelsen at the top
The class is topped by the Norwegian Andreas Mikkelsen who has a reassuring lead of 25.4 seconds to compatriot Mads Østberg who had major problems during the weekend.
Østberg in turn is heavily chased by the Bolivian Martin Bulacia, 2.1 seconds behind, and the Frenchman Adrien Fourmaux who has 4.2 seconds up to the Norwegian.
On Sunday, the six final distances in the competition await.