Tänak fourth after Rally Kenya opening stage
Ott Tänak finished fourth in Thursday afternoon's opening speed test WRC Safari Rally Kenya, which has returned to the calendar after a near twenty-year absence.
Six-time world champion and current table leader Sebastien Ogier (France, Toyota) was fastest, posting a time of 3 m 21.5s, on the 4.84km Kasarani speed test. Ogier was followed by teammates Kalle Rovanperä (Finland) and Elfyn Evans (Wales), then Tänak in the Hyundai i20.
Rally Kenya is back on the WRC agenda this year, after a 17-year absence, extended by a year after the pandemic forced last season's event off the calendar. An African Rally Championship had been held in Kenya annually starting 2003.
The first full day of competition is already underway at the time of writing, having started 8.09 a.m. Estonian time Friday.
The event traces its lineage to the inaugural event in 1953, when it was held to mark the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II, at a time when Kenya was under British rule.
The last WRC winner in Kenya was the late Colin McRae, who won there in a Ford Focus in July 2002.
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Editor: Andrew Whyte
