Estonian Ott Tanak (Hyundai i20 Rally1) took overnight lead in the opening pair of stages of WRC Safari Rally by 2.4 seconds ahead of the Toyota GR Yaris of Japan’s Takamoto Katsuta and his Tyrone co-driver Aaron Johnson on Thursday.
Luxemburg’s Gregoire Munster (Ford Puma Rally1) was a mere two-tenths of a second further behind in third.
Rally Sweden champion Elfyn Evans of Toyota was best on the opening Super Special Kasarani (4.75km) with Belgium’s Thierry Neuville, who went head to head with the Welshman, finishing 1.5s behind and tying with team mate and former winner Kalle Rovanpera with Tanak some 0.7s further behind.
Adrien Fourmaux (Hyundai) and Grégoire Munster (M-Sport Ford) shared fifth place followed by McErlean.
The second stage, Mzabibu, an 8.27km run through Morendat Farm vineyards, Tanak set the pace to move into the lead, Katsuta was heading for an impressive stage time until he appeared to out-brake himself near the stage finish and ended up in the vineyard before getting back on the road without any damage, despite the indiscretion, he finished just 1.1s behind stage pacesetter Tanak.
Neuville seemed to have issues through the latter part of the stage and finished the day 19.7s off the lead. M-Sport Ford driver Munster pushed hard to post third fastest stage time to occupy the same position on the overall leaderboard.
In the WRC 2, it was an all-Kenyan affair to round up the top 20 overall as Karan Patel, Jeremiah Wahome, Hamza Anwar and Carl Tundo all separated by less than seven seconds respectively.
Patel once again led the charge for Kenya in SS2, placing eighth in the WRC 2 category.
Tundo had a better run of it in Super Stage 2, posting a 7:40.2 in ninth place (WRC 2).
The same could not be said for Anwar, though, who crossed the line with a 65-second deficit to Patel.
Most drivers at the end of the day were relatively content with their outings, with the main challenge beginning Friday.
“We are in a good position to start the real rally tomorrow, I think it’s going to be a very different kind of driving and much more surviving than today”, Rovanpera said post-SS2.
Katsuta ended the day content with how his car felt under him in the mixed dry/wet conditions and is confident that he can put in a good performance Friday.
“I’m feeling very comfortable with the car – conditions are quite difficult to judge – which corner is slippery and which is not. For sure this kind of situation is going to be many stages this weekend.”
Young Kenyan star Tinashe Gatimu was also pleased with how her first day turned out in the National Class.
“The run was okay, we had a slight issue with the car which we’re trying to sort out – otherwise, it was good.”
One man who definitely did not enjoy his time out on the opening day, however, was Hyudai’s Adrien Formoux.
He was a non-starter in SS2 and was seen getting a push by a group of Naivasha locals on his way to the stage start.
The man, at the forefront of the FIA swearing-ban controversy, received a 10-minute penalty but will restart the rally tomorrow.
The action begins at 07:13 am EAT on Friday on a brand new stage for this year’s edition – Camp Moran – a testing 31.4km route that combines narrow, technical tracks, fast dips, jumps and rocky outcrops.
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