Safari Rally 2000
LEG TWO
The second day of the Safari started with the longest competitive section of the rally, the 123 km Marigat stage. Burns was again fastest, Kankkunen second, but then came Ford drivers Sainz and McRae whose tyre problems seemed to have disappeared overnight. McRae took third place from Auriol, who had a puncture.
Sainz was fastest on the following stage (CS6) and McRae was second. Sainz, now in 7th place, was chasing hard the drivers in front of him and moving swiftly up the leaderboard. On CS7 he won again and climbed into the 5th position. Petter Solberg dropped to 7th; he had been passed by the privately entered Subaru of Toshihiro Arai earlier. The Japanese driver has been going extremely well in the Safari. Freddy Loix who was driving firmly in the top ten dropped and finally retired with technical problems.
On the final stage of the day, CS8, Sainz was fastest once again, but Colin McRae stopped on the stage and retired due to a technical problem. In the front Richard Burns still leads Kankkunen with a margin of just under five minutes, so the Subaru drivers were where they started in the morning. Auriol moved back into third, but he is already 15 minutes behind Burns. Sainz is almost six minutes behind Auriol, and Solberg took the 5th place as Arai had problems on the final stage losing several minutes. Marcus Gronholm, who was going relatively well in his and Peugeot's first Safari has also retired with a clutch failure. His team-mate Gilles Panizzi, who retired earlier, received a US$50,000 penalty from the FIA after punching a gr N driver for allegedly holding him up on a stage.
Situation after CS 8 of 12:
1. Richard Burns (ENG) Subaru - 5.45.23,0
2. Juha Kankkunen (FIN) Subaru +4.55,0
3. Didier Auriol (FRA) Seat +15.35,0
4. Carlos Sainz (ESP) Ford +21.19,0
5. Petter Solberg (NOR) Ford +24.55,0
6. Toshihiko Arai (JPN) Subaru +33.13,0
7. Armin Schwarz (GER) Skoda +40.22,0
8. Luis Climent (ESP) Skoda +59.32,0
