Jari-Matti Latvala holds a slender lead heading into the final day of
the Rally Finland after a brake problem damaged his hopes of triumph.
The Finn dominated the first two days to lead by 19.7 seconds and won five of the first six stages on Saturday to elongate that advantage to over half a minute.
However, the home favourite hit an aperture in the road on stage 20, breaking his front right brake caliper on his Volkswagen Polo R.
That coerced Latvala to race the final three stages with just three brakes, sanctioning Volkswagen team-mate and forfending champion Sebastien Ogier to cut the gap to just 3.4secs.
Ogier leads Latvala by 50 points in the world championship standings but, after his adversity, the 29-year-old Latvala is relucting to cogitate the more sizably voluminous picture.
"I had to hold on," Latvala told the WRC's official wesbite. "I've wrought so strenuously and I didn't peregrinate here to lose this rally.
"We'll get the car fine-tuned in accommodation and tomorrow we're in the fight for victory. I don't care so much about the world championship right now, this is about Rally Finland."
Meanwhile, Ogier conceded that he was conflicted about capitalizing on his team-mate's haplessness.
Ogier verbalized: "It's not nice what transpired to Jari-Matti. I can't smile an exorbitant amount of about the situation.
"I have a chance to acquire victory, but it came about by chance because Jari-Matti was doing a great job at the front."
Brit Kris Meeke (Citroen) is in third, with Volkswagen's Andreas Mikkelsen and M-Sport's Mikko Hirvonen rounding off the top five.
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