Young Latvian driver Ralfs Sirmacis leads after completion of six special stages on leg one of SEAJETS Acropolis Rally, third round of FIA E...
Young Latvian driver Ralfs Sirmacis leads after completion of six special stages on leg one of SEAJETS Acropolis Rally, third round of FIA ERC. On his debut with the R5 Fabia, he drove with some serious pace to trouble the top drivers. As Kajetan Kajetanowicz crashed in the very first stage, Sirmacis capitalised on that and took the lead. But his lead was trimmed to just eight seconds after the final stage of the day. Alexey Lukyanuk is second overall and Jaromir Tarabus is in third overall.
Leg one consisted of six special stages. Kajetan Kajetanowicz day began with a crash on the very first stage. He rolled his Fiesta R5. Ralfs Sirmacis went quickest on the stage and took the lead. On special stage two Kajetanowicz came back hard to win the stage, but it was too late as he had lost bulk of the time during his roll. Sirmacis was second fastest and kept his lead intact. Third stage was won by Alexey Lukyanuk, but he received a 10 seconds time penalty for jump start. He was 27.2 seconds behind Sirmacis before heading to mid day service.
In the afternoon loop, Kajetanowicz won two more stages and final stage went to Alexey Lukyanuk. It was a muddy final stage and drivers struggled with the tyres. But Lukyanuk had preserved his tyres and won the stage and trimmed the lead to just 8 seconds. Sirmacis set some impressive times to keep his lead all day long. But in the final test he was fourth fastest and lost much more time. Jaromir Tarabus is third overall in his Fabia R5. Local star Lambros Athanassoulas is in fourth overall, he was in third for most of the day but lost time in the final test. Raul Jeets rounded off the top five. David Botka had a tough day in the office as he suffered fuel pump issues and had to retire.
In ERC 2 class Polish driver Wojciech Chuchała holds the lead by 28.7 seonds in his Subaru Impreza. Peter Ranga and Tibor Erdi are in second and third repectively. Murat Bostanci leads ERC 3 in his Firsta R2T.
Overall After Leg One
| Pos. | No. |   | Driver / Co-driver Vehicle | Pos. | SS time Penalty | Total time | Diff.Leader Diff.Prev. |
| 1 | 11 |  1 | Sirmacis Ralfs / Šimins Arturs Škoda Fabia R5 | RC2 1 | 01:23:29.4 | 01:23:29.4 | 00:00:00.0 00:00:00.0 |
| 2 | 2 | 2 | Lukyanuk Alexey / Kapustin Roman Ford Fiesta R5 | RC2 2 | 01:23:27.4 00:00:10.0 | 01:23:37.4 | 00:00:08.0 00:00:08.0 |
| 3 | 3 | 3 | Tarabus J. / Trunkát Daniel Škoda Fabia R5 | RC2 3 | 01:24:14.9 00:00:10.0 | 01:24:24.9 | 00:00:55.5 00:00:47.5 |
| 4 | 9 | 4 | Athanassoulas L. / Panagiotounis E. Škoda Fabia R5 | RC2 4 | 01:24:34.4 00:00:10.0 | 01:24:44.4 | 00:01:15.0 00:00:19.5 |
| 5 | 6 | 5 | Jeets Raul / Toom Andrus Škoda Fabia R5 | RC2 5 | 01:25:40.8 | 01:25:40.8 | 00:02:11.4 00:00:56.4 |
| 6 | 10 | 6 | Kołtun J. / Pleskot I. Ford Fiesta R5 | RC2 6 | 01:25:42.8 | 01:25:42.8 | 00:02:13.4 00:00:02.0 |
| 7 | 17 | 7 | Chuchała W. / Dymurski Daniel Subaru Impreza STI | RC2 7 | 01:27:15.6 | 01:27:15.6 | 00:03:46.2 00:01:32.8 |
| 8 | 18 | 8 | Ranga Péter / Bán Viktor Mitsubishi Lancer Evo IX | RC2 8 | 01:27:44.3 | 01:27:44.3 | 00:04:14.9 00:00:28.7 |
| 9 | 8 | 10 | Kasperczyk T. / Syty Damian Ford Fiesta R5 | RC2 9 | 01:28:17.0 | 01:28:17.0 | 00:04:47.6 00:00:32.7 |
| 10 | 27 | 11 | Panteli Petros / Constantinou C. Mitsubishi Lancer Evo X | RC2 10 | 01:28:23.7 | 01:28:23.7 | 00:04:54.3 00:00:06.7 |
Tomorrow crews have to tackle six more stages. Will the rookie emerge on top or the veterans bite back hard. Lets see it for tomorrow. You can get all updates on the world of rally by subscribing to us. Until then, Happy Rallying!
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