Rali Terras d’Aboboreira/PEC1: Kris Meeke pulverized competition

Kris Meeke / Stuart Loudon (Hyundai I20 Rally2) are the first leaders of the Rali Terras d’Aboboreira.

After all, despite the bad luck they had in qualifying, in which the car, when slightly off course, hit the hill on the right side of the road, catapulting the Hyundai, which overturned and fell down a bank, Kris Meeke / Stuart Loudon (Hyundai I20 Rally2) stayed with an apparent bad position on the road due to not having recorded a time in qualifying for the Rali Terras d’Aboboreira, but sometimes there are evils that come for good and the fact that the rain made – heavily – its appearance in the first twist of the race, made life much more difficult for those riding further back, which combined with the Irishman’s good pace allowed him to win the opening section of the race, 8.9s ahead of Yohan Rossel / Arnaud Dunand (Citroën C3 Rally2) with Nikolay Gryazin / Konstantin Aleksandrov (Citroën C3 Rally2) third at 11.2s.

Having moved much further back in order, the Citroën men gave way for some time. A curious thing: the first three are all from Sports &You.

Fourth time for Jan Solans / Rodrigo Sanjuan (Toyota Yaris Rally2) with 0.7s less than Gryazin, followed by Pierre-Louis Loubet / Loris Pascaud (Škoda Fabia Rs Rally2) with another 1.7s.

Josh Mcerlean / James Fulton (Škoda Fabia RS Rally2), first on the road he gave up 13.9s to his compatriot, in seventh were Marco Bulacia / Diego Vallejo (Citroën C3 Rally2) and then several Portuguese teams: the fastest were Rúben Rodrigues / António Costa (Škoda Fabia RS Rally2) who were 20.4s behind Meeke, followed by Armindo Araújo / Luís Ramalho (Škoda Fabia RS Rally2) at a further 3.5, with Ricardo Teodósio / José Teixeira (Hyundai I20 Rally2) just behind at a further 3.5s .

11th place for José Pedro Fontes / Inês Ponte (Citroën C3 Rally2), 7.0s behind Teodósio, followed by Alexander Villanueva / Jose Murado (Škoda Fabia RS Rally2), and Pedro Meireles / Ricardo Cunha (Hyundai I20 N Rally2) who lost a minute for Meeke.

Soon after, Paulo Neto / Nuno Mota Ribeiro (Škoda Fabia R5 Evo), Ernesto Cunha / Rui Raimundo (Škoda Fabia R5 Evo), Lucas Simões / Valter Cardoso (Ford Fiesta R5 Mk II), Rui Madeira / Nuno Rodrigues Da Silva ( Ford Fiesta MKII Rally2), João Barros / Jorge Henriques (Volkswagen Polo GTI R5), Pedro Almeida / Mário Castro (Škoda Fabia Evo Rally2), Hugo Lopes / Magda Oliveira (Peugeot 208 Rally4) were the fastest in the 2RM (for now, but there are still competitors to pass), João Andrade / Pedro Santana (Peugeot 208 Rally4), Ricardo Filipe / Filipe Carvalho (Škoda Fabia R5), and Gonçalo Henriques / Gonçalo Cunha (Renault Clio Rally4) who gave up 11.2s to Hugo Lopes.

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