The Estonian is 4.5 places behind leader Sebastien Ogier, who overtook Neuville after the latter saw a poor first few runs on Friday.

Starting third in the first stage, Tänak capitalized on his teammate's track-cleaning efforts and posted a good time, but Ogier was even faster, taking the lead by 7.7 seconds after that first stage.

The Hyundai i20 had also faced hybrid issues throughout Friday's stages.

Tänak won for Hyundai on the gravel roads of Sardinia two years ago, as he had done back in 2017, and came second in the Portuguese rally earlier in May.

Ahead of the race, the Estonian said: "Sardinia presents some big challenges; it can be very slippery, and finding the required grip is difficult. Combined with some very high temperatures, it all makes everything much harder."

Tänak's teammate Thierry Neuville won last year's race, while Tänak had to pull out in stage nine.

"This is a race where the rallying is more interesting than usual, and that has always been my preference. In Portugal, we were very close to winning before the tire rupture, so our plan in Sardinia is to improve on that," Tänak went on.

Tänak had finished second overall in the Portugal rally and also collected 26 points thanks to the power stage.

He remains third in the overall WRC drivers' standings going into Rally Sardinia, on 79 points, behind Welshman Elfyn Evans (Toyota) on 86 points, and overall leader Thierry Neuville (Belgium), who has 110 points.

Dani Sordo (Hyundai), Takamoto Katsuta, and Sebastien Ogier (both Toyota), and the M-Sport duo of Adrien Fourmaux and Gregoire Munster are also starting in the full WRC category in Sardinia, while other Estonians racing are Robert Vires ( Škoda) and Georg Linnamäe (Toyota) in the WRC2 class, plus Romet Jürgenson and his Estonian co-driver Siim Oja (Ford) in the JWRC class.

The race this year follows a more compact schedule, part of a broader WRC move towards more flexible schedules, and will cover 266.12 kilometers on the Mediterranean island, in the space of less than 48 hours.

The race started Friday, rather than Thursday as is usually the case, and ends Sunday lunchtime as per tradition.

"I would say that the drivers also like it for the most part," said WRC promoter Peter Thul said earlier this year, of the new format.

Tänak came fourth in the 2.08-kilometer shakedown run on Friday morning, 1.2 seconds behind stage winner Neuville (2:13.7).

Shaking down before warming up for this afternoon #WRC | #RallyItaliaSardegna pic.twitter.com/h7P1ECXM3b

— World Rally Championship (@OfficialWRC) May 31, 2024

Eight-time world champion, Frenchman Sebastien Ogier (Toyota) came second, 0.5 seconds behind Neuville.

"Overall, the road conditions were pretty good during recce. Probably even a little better than in previous years," Tänak said of the first effort.

"This year, the Sardinia rally is half a day shorter, so we have to push from the start," he went on, after the second pass of the shakedown stage.

Georg Linnamäe secured a stage win in the WRC2 category, while Romet Jürgenson showed strong performance in the JWRC category too.

The Sardinia rally continues on Saturday morning and had already got underway at 8:41 a.m. with stage five.

Seven more stages follow on Saturday, the final one starting at 7.05 p.m., then on Sunday come stages 13 to 15, followed by the power stage, starting at 1.15 p.m.

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