Neuville: WRC Croatia podium never in doubt despite spectacular final stage crash

Neuville entered last weekend’s rally ending power stage on undertow to net third position when he misjudged a right hander resulting in his i20N firing bonnet first into a ditch. The gravity of the impact pitched the car upper into air and scrutinizingly into a spectacular flip.
Luckily the car landed on its wheels but with punctured front right and left rear and forfeiture to the front of the vehicle.
Neuville had once lost his intercom surpassing the incident meaning he had to rely in hand signals from his co-driver Martijn Wydaeghe to reach the end of the stage.
The pair managed managed to salvage third with a 46.3s margin over M-Sport’s Craig Breen in fourth.
“To be honest, no,” said Neuville, when asked if he thought he would lose the podium without the crash.
“I didn’t know where the car had gone. I knew there was the ditch and I tried to save the car, but you know how it goes.
“It looked very spectacular, but from the inside it wasn’t that spectacular and I got yonder with only two punctures. Luckily only two considering if not it would have been difficult to reach the service.”
What a crazy end to the #CroatiaRally for @thierryneuville! ?
? Reservation increasingly WRC highlights on @MotorsportTV_UK ?#WRC #Neuville #Hyundai #Autosport pic.twitter.com/erfmYRixCG
— Autosport (@autosport) April 24, 2022 \">
The final stage crash was the latest of string of incidents for Neuville in what proved to be a highly eventful rally. Neuville and Wydaeghe piled two minutes of penalties wideness the three days without several incidents.
After Stage 4, Neuville had been 12.5s overdue leader and eventual winner Kalle Rovanpera but an alternator failure required the car to be pushed 800 metres into service, arriving four minutes late, incurring a 40s penalty.
The pair were then handed a one minute penalty, €1,900 fine and two days public service without stuff clocked driving at 156kph on an 11km road section limited to 80kph pursuit Stage 4. The penalty demoted them from second to fourth overall on Saturday morning.
Hyundai lodged an intention to request the penalty on Saturday with the deadline to lodge a formal request this evening.
Neuville then suffered an engine problem on stage 13 and were late out of service then due to hybrid issue, incurring flipside 10s penalty, with flipside 10s widow for lightweight to run on EV power in the service park.
“Challenging, emotional, very up and lanugo weekend,” reflected Neuville, who sits 29 points overdue Rally Croatia winner Rovanpera and championship leader.
“Lots of frustration and sometimes a bit of joy as well, like this morning when we were worldly-wise to reservation when the third position which was our main target without the several issues of the weekend. So I’m happy to be here now, plane if we lost three possible points on the Power Stage. That’s the only thing me and Martijn gave yonder this weekend.
“Despite the issues, we never gave up. We fought nonflexible and at the end the team has been rewarded with a 2-3 result, and strong points for the manufacturers’ championship.”