Unsurprisingly, Sebastien Ogier claimed his fifth win of 2015 at the LOTOS Rally Poland this weekend, ahead of Volkswagen team-mate Andreas Mikkelsen.
Ogier led the proceedings from Friday afternoon and survived an attack from Mikkelsen this morning to remain out front during two runnings of the Baranowo stage.
Jari-Matti Latvala was unable to make it an all-Volkswagen podium, having crashed in the final stage whilst attempting to catch Ott Tanak. The M-Sport driver therefore scored his first top-three finish of 2015.
Overall, Ogier held a lead of 11.9 seconds after 19 stages, and Tanak finished 23 seconds down on the leader. A further 21.7 seconds behind was Latvala, followed by a Hyundai duo of Hayden Paddon and Thierry Neuville. The latter had an issue this morning when he rolled and picked up a wooden post, but was able to finish the rally despite sustaining serious damage.
In seventh place was Citroen‘s Kris Meeke who bounced back from a roll in Thursday’s shakedown. Eighth position went to home favourite Robert Kubica ahead of Mads Østberg and Dani Sordo.
“I have had so many great wins, but no-one wanted to help me on this one,” said Ogier, who won eight of the 18 stages. “I was first on the road for 90% of the rally and I have 28 points again. We had to push from the first metre to the last one and I enjoyed that. Now I have a small break and I go on the beach in the Bahamas…”
