Breen keeps pace with Neuville at Rally Sweden

Top 15 Rally Sweden classificiaton after SS11

Craig Breen has become Thierry Neuville’s main challenger for victory at Rally Sweden after Saturday morning’s opening loop with the Hyundai driver’s lead less than six seconds after SS11.

Breen, hunting a maiden WRC victory, has pushed past Neuville’s Hyundai teammates Andreas Mikkelsen and Hayden Paddon to take second place on the overall times just 5.9s off of Neuville. The Belgian driver was able to narrowly open up his lead on the final stage of the morning loop with victory on Vargasen 1 but after Breen’s impressive Friday afternoon charge the battle for victory remains very tight.

Mikkelsen suffered a spin which cost him around 15 seconds on SS10 but jumped back to third place ahead of Paddon at the end of SS11 and is 17.6s off overall leader Neuville with Paddon 1.6s behind Mikkelsen.

Mads Ostberg is also within striking distance of the front-runners in fifth place as 21.5s splits the top five contenders. Toyota trio Esapekka Lappi, Jari-Matti Latvala and Ott Tanak continue their chase in the midfield while Teemu Suninen continues to lead the M-Sport Ford charge down in ninth.

Kris Meeke has kept hold of the final points place in 10^th for Citroen with both M-Sport’s Sebastien Ogier and Elfyn Evans out of the points and off the pace.

Ford driver Takamoto Katsuta continues to lead the WRC2 class with an eight second advantage over Skoda’s Pontus Tidemand.