WRC news in brief: Sardegna post rally

Here’s a selection of post event snippets from Rally Italia Sardegna

— Frenchman Stephane Consani lost his WRC-3 podium result and dropped to sixth in class after Rally Italia Sardegna stewards hit him with a 14-minute time penalty on Saturday night. Consani was leading the class until the end of the penultimate stage when his Citroen DS3 R3T picked up an electrical problem.

Consani collected a 1m50s penalty for arriving at the final stage 11 minutes late and then lost a further four minutes mid-stage. But worse was to come after the rally, when Stewards imposed the additional penalty on him and his co-driver Maxime Vilmot for breaking WRC rules and working on their car in the zone between the time control and the start of SS16.

— WRC-2 winner Robert Kubica has revealed that he considered pulling out of Rally Italia Sardegna after the opening day because of poor visibility. In common with many WRC-2 drivers, the Pole [pictured above] was unhappy to be running at one-minute intervals through each stage because of the amount of dust hanging in the air from the cars ahead. World Rally Car crews, in contrast, started at two-minute gaps.

Kubica said: “In SS1, which is 30 kilometres long, I was 20 kilometres in the dust and it’s just dangerous and there is no point to do it. I was very upset, okay the conditions are the same for everybody, but the starting order is not the same for everybody and if you are behind you are losing time.”

— Sebastien Ogier’s Power Stage win in Sardinia maintains Volkswagen’s record of scooping the maximum three bonus points from every rally so far this season. For the fifth time from six rallies, ‘Mr Power Stage’ (VW’s words - not ours) hoovered-up the maximum three points on offer. The one time he missed out, Rally Argentina, his team-mate Jari-Matti Latvala took them instead.

— Basketball star Carlos Garcia Fessman hopes to return the WRC in Finland after making his European rally debut in Sardinia. The Venezuelan completed just one stage on Friday before a turbo problem stopped his Mitsubishi Lancer EVO, but he completed all of Saturday’s stages to finish 35th overall.