Sbastien Ogier made it nine wins from 13 starts in this year’s World Rally Championship with a win in the forests of Wales on Sunday.
Ogier, who wrapped up his first WRC title at Rally France last month, led the British season finale from start to finish in his works Volkswagen Polo.
“This is the perfect end to a perfect season,” Ogier said. “I am very happy, and extremely proud of this win, as the Rally [Great Britain] is one of the toughest on the calendar. Things have not always gone to plan here for me in recent years. We just tried to maintain the gap through to the finish today. Now that the season is over, I can look back on what has really been an incredible year. If anyone had predicted before the start of the season that [we] would end up with nine wins and the world championship title to our name, we would probably have sent him straight to the team doctor.”
His teammate, Jari-Matti Latvala, finished second but it wasn’t enough to prevent Thierry Neuville from claiming the runner-up spot in the final drivers’ standings after the Belgian finished third on Rally GB for the privateer M-Sport team.
“I’m really, really happy with this because I couldn’t imagine at the start of the season it would be possible,” said Neuville. “The team has done a great job and Nicolas [Gilsoul] and me have worked really hard to achieve this. Thank you to everybody for the help we have had.”
Having won Rally GB for the last two seasons, Latvala was disappointed to have been beaten to a third victory by Ogier, whose winning margin was 21.8 seconds at the finish in Llandudno on the north Welsh coast. “I was hungry for my third victory but it didn’t work out this year,” said Latvala. “Speed wise it was good but we made too many mistakes and I didn’t have the right rhythm all weekend.”
For Ogier, meanwhile, his first Rally GB win cements a dominant campaign by the 29-year-old Frenchman. “It’s been really amazing and once again the car has been perfect. The rally has not been the best for me in the past. Now I need to conserve the title next year, that’s the most important thing.”
With the top three positions all but secure starting the final day, the battle for fourth place between Norwegians Andreas Mikkelsen and Mads stberg became the main focus. Mikkelsen, in the third factory Polo, started Sunday’s opening test 7.3 seconds in front of his countryman but a spin on the 21.34-kilometer Dyfnant test dropped him down to fifth. His efforts to recover the lost time ended in a high-speed spin on Clocaenog, which left his car sporting a few bumps and scrapes at the finish.
“For sure it has been a good weekend but it didn’t end the way we wanted,” said Mikkelsen. “Sadly I made two mistakes which cost me that fourth place. I tried everything but we hit the bank with the right rear and spun in fifth gear. I was very lucky to get through, it was not so nice.”
stberg, who held on to take fourth, said: “It was a good fight but big shame we didn’t find this performance earlier on the rally. We wanted to get to the end with a good last day and some good speed and we achieved this.”
Behind Mikkelsen, Czech driver Martin Prokop finished sixth with Dani Sordo seventh and young Welsh driver Elfyn Evans winning the WRC 2 category in eighth place.
The 2014 WRC season kicks off with the Monte Carlo Rally from Jan. 14-19.
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