Paulo Goncalves was able to make the most of a far-from-easy fourth day at the Sardinia Rally Race. After having to open the track on both of the day’s special stages the Portuguese rider finished by successfully defending his position.
Paulo Gonçalves once again got lumbered with the tricky job of having to open the track today, after his second win yesterday. The Team HRC rider set a strong pace that served to mark out the route for the pursuing rivals, none of whom were able to reach him before the arrival at the refuelling point. Paulo recorded the eighth-best time. Things fared better in the second special, where after pushing even harder, he was able to round off the day with the fourth-fastest time on the stopwatch. Once again no-one was able to stop him crossing the line in San Teodoro in first place.
Goncalves moves up to fifth in the general race rankings some 11’52 behind the leader, a distance that the Portuguese rider will be looking to whittle down tomorrow. Likewise, the Team HRC adept will be striving to close down the gap with arch-rival Marc Coma.
Honda rider Jacopo Cerutti, who is being monitored by Team HRC, turned in a fine first part of the day with a second-place finish behind Mathias Walkner, before conceding time to the front-runners in the latter part.
The fifth stage of the Sardinia Rally Race, which winds up the eighth edition of this event, will be fought out over a looping route from San Teodoro that will include two time-specials; the first featuring 100 kilometres and a second of less then 50 kilometres.
