Ott Tänak has turned 4.1 second mid-leg deficit into a 5.7 second overnight advantage during the afternoon loop of stages on Rally Germany.

Despite a tricky afternoon during which many of the drivers have slid off the road, the Estonian included, he retakes the lead and heads Andreas Mikkelsen who took the surprise advantage this morning despite a poor starting position.

Championship contenders Sébastien Ogier and Thierry Neuville have also swapped positions with Neuville now climbing to third when his rival spun in the final stage.

After torrential rain during the mid-day service, crews headed back out to the same two vineyard stages this afternoon before returning to the super special stage.

The repeated Mittelmosel stage was rain soaked and again the crews ran different configurations of tyres, but mostly on full wets. Tänak took the stage win, even though he went straight into a vineyard on a tight hairpin, and managed to overhaul Mikkelsen in the following test.

He then got stuck on some mud in the final stage and struggled to get back on the road on the slick tyres but held on to his advantage after a very tricky day of competition. Mikkelsen, in only his third outing in the C3 WRC, has excelled and barely put a foot wrong, showing the true potential of the car on tarmac.

Behind him, Neuville climbed from sixth to third during the afternoon; he had a spin in the first stage, struggled with wheel spin and braking and then also ran wide in the final stage but was able to take Ogier when the Frenchman spun and lost 20 seconds, dropping him down to fourth but only 2.4 seconds adrift.

Elfyn Evans continues to hold fifth after a reasonably uneventful afternoon and the Welshman heads Juho Hänninen who is now the lead Toyota driver after Esapekka Lappi ended up in a wall with broken suspension and had to retire.

Craig Breen struggled with confidence this afternoon and then spun into a field. Nevertheless he is seventh and within striking distance of Hänninen. Latvala has moved into eighth but is now nearly two minutes adrift of the lead after his engine woes of the morning.

Hayden Paddon admitted to needing to regain his confidence tomorrow and the Kiwi is ninth with asphalt ace Jan Kopecky moving into the top 10 in his Škoda Fabia R5. The Czech driver heads the FIA WRC 2 Championship but is in a close battle with category leader Pontus Tidemand, the Swede only 5.8 seconds behind.

The FIA Junior WRC Championship was a close-fought fight until series leader Nil Solans retired with suspension damage. With him out of the game today, his closest championship rival, Nicolas Ciamin, will be looking to capitalise and close the gap in the standings before they head to Spain for the final round of their series.

Rally Germany – Provisional results after Section 3

Underdog Jan Kopecky was the shock leader of Rally Germany after winning Thursday night’s opening speed test in Saarbrücken.

But the tight and twisty city centre roads proved the undoing of Kris Meeke who failed to finish after hitting a concrete barrier.

Big crowds gathered in the heart of the city for the rally’s first visit to Saarland’s capital. And Kopecký put on a spectacular show, the asphalt expert outgunning the big name drivers to top the times in his WRC 2-specification Skoda Fabia R5.

The Czech pilot was 0.3sec quicker than Ott Tänak’s Ford Fiesta. Craig Breen was a further 1.0sec behind, despite swiping a concrete wall in the opening corner and damaging his C3’s rear left wheel.+

Video: SS1 Highlights

Andreas Mikkelsen was fourth in another C3, the Norwegian tied with Sébastien Ogier. They were 0.3sec clear of Jari-Matti Latvala, whose Toyota Yaris completed the top six.

Ogier got the better of title rival Thierry Neuville, who was ninth in his Hyundai i20 and 2.7sec off the lead pace.

Meeke was devastated after hitting a barrier on the inside of a right bend. He tried to limp on but his Citroën C3’s steering was broken and he parked the car shortly afterwards. It exited the test on the back of a tow truck and the Briton will restart tomorrow with a 10min penalty.

Hayden Paddon, Dani Sordo and local hero Armin Kremer, driving a 2017 Fiesta for the first time, all clouted a barrier but survived unscathed.

Friday’s first full day features the fast, hairpin-strewn vineyards above the Mosel river. A double pass of the familiar Mittelmosel and Grafschaft stages are sandwiched by three runs of a new circuit test at Wadern-Weiskirchen. The seven stages cover 108.51km.

After four Friday morning stages on Rally Germany, and no fewer than four different leaders overall, Andreas Mikkelsen tops the leaderboard for Citroën Racing on the 10th round of the FIA World Rally Championship.

Ott Tänak, another of the early pace-setters, is second in the Fiesta WRC with team-mate Sébastien Ogier third having recovered from a spin in the day’s opener.

The 2017 ADAC Rallye Deutschland got underway last night in Saarbrücken with a short and twisty street stage which was won by Jan Kopecky in the smaller Škoda R5 rally car.

Losing an event on these super special stages can sometimes be the case and the first victim of the event was the luckless Kris Meeke, the Citroën driver clipping a barrier and breaking the steering.

While he was able to re-join under Rally 2 regulations this morning, a 10-minute penalty has put paid to any hope of a top result in Germany in the C3 WRC that has proven to be so fast on tarmac.

Video   Rally Germany 2017: Highlights stages 1-4

Today, the crews headed from Bostalsee and the morning loop included two runs through a super special stage and two narrow tests in the vineyards littered with hairpins.

Mikkelsen, driving the C3 for only the third time, had a far from beneficial lowly road position but in the drier conditions this morning the Norwegian struggled less with mud being dragged on to the road from the drivers ahead and he was able to power ahead of Tänak and take the lead, revelling in the performance of the car on tarmac. Like everyone, Tänak has found the conditions challenging and despite dropping from the lead after SS3, the Estonian is only 4.1 seconds adrift at the mid-leg service.

Ogier didn’t have the greatest start spinning into a field in the first stage, but the reigning FIA World Rally Champion has bounced back from seventh to third and is crucially ahead of championship rival Thierry Neuville, who is down in fifth after also going off into a vineyard in the second stage. Elfyn Evans sandwiches the title contenders in fourth, the Welshman struggling with understeer during the morning stages.

Behind fifth-placed Neuville, Rally Finland victor Esapekka Lappi is sixth in the lead Toyota Yaris WRC. The Finn is far from confident on this surface but is faring well as he gains more experience on tarmac. Craig Breen and Juho Hänninen are however hot on his heels in seventh, the rivals both just 2.3 seconds adrift.

Hayden Paddon, another driver who is happier on gravel, played a waiting game for rain with his tyre choice but it failed to pay off when conditions were drier than expected. He then picked up a puncture in the penultimate stage and dropped more time. Jari-Matti Latvala rounds off the top 10, the Finn higher up the leaderboard until an engine misfire dropped him back; he is now over 90 seconds adrift of the lead. 

Dani Sordo, starting his 150th WRC event, was on the pace this morning and led after the opening stage. However the Spaniard then went off the road in the third stage and was forced into a disappointing retirement on an event he had targeted for a win. 

The FIA WRC 2 Championship category has a strong field in Germany and tarmac ace Jan Kopecky is topping the field in the Škoda R5. Pontus Tidemand, fighting for an unassailable lead in the Championship, is second and only 5.9 seconds adrift in similar machinery. The FIA Junior WRC Championship contenders are also continuing their season-long battle and Rally Finland category winner Nicolas Ciamin is ahead of his rival for the title, Nil Solans.

Championship leader Thierry Neuville was fastest in Rally Germany shakedown on Thursday morning.

The Belgian was quickest through the mainly dry 4.09km Eiweiler test by 0.9sec from Andreas Mikkelsen, who returns to the Citroën Abu Dhabi squad after missing last month’s encounter in Finland.

Sébastien Ogier, who is tied with Neuville at the top of the points, was third fastest. The M-Sport World Rally Team pilot has a new Ford Fiesta at his disposal this weekend, his third new car of the campaign.

Neuville’s pace-setting time came in his first run. He completed three more in his Hyundai i20, opting for Michelin’s hard compound tyres in the first two and softer rubber for the final two as he looked ahead to tomorrow’s opening leg when rain is forecast.

“The road was quite clean to start with but I was on hard tyres, so still a good time,” he said. “I made a couple of small changes for the final runs to try for wet conditions and find some traction.

“The road became dirty. It was a particular part of the stage in the forest which was very dirty, but the rest was OK,” Neuville added.

All the leading drivers except Ott Tänak and Hayden Paddon set their benchmark time during the first pass. Conditions worsened as cars dragged and mud and stones onto the asphalt and the times slowed.

Ogier missed a hairpin during his first run but was fastest in the second pass, 1.4sec clear of Craig Breen’s Citroën C3

Kris Meeke was fourth in his C3, with Breen and Jari-Matti Latvala’s Toyota Yaris filling the rest of the top six.

Leading times: