The final place on the podium went to 6-times Hungarian Touring Car Champion Frigyes Turán (HUN, Ford).After back-to-back retirements on his first two nominated rounds of the SWRC season, Turán came to Greecewith the same strategy as Hänninen and Sousa – drive his own event and conquer the tough Greek stages tomake it to the end of the rally. He successfully achieved this, but not without a battle with young Škoda driverHermann Gassner (DEU). When Tänak’s retirement was followed by then-fourth placed Eyvind Brynildsen’s(NOR, Škoda) retirement from Day Two due to a broken suspension on SS11, Turán and Gassner jockeyed forposition throughout the remaining tests. It was the Hungarian who triumphed, but Gassner was pleased tofinish fourth on his Greek debut and gain vital experience on the treacherous stages.While Tänak was the only one of the ten strong field to retire from the event completely, 2009 JWRC ChampionProkop was the final SWRC competitor to complete all the stages without retirement, coming home fifth andearning 10 vital SWRC points to retain second position in the Championship standings. Meanwhile the sheerspeed of Al-Attiyah, whose Day One trials left him in sixth in the SWRC at the end of the rally, made it impossiblefor him to go unnoticed as he topped both the series sprinter standings and picking up 12 stage wins out of 18.
DRIVER QUOTES
1st – Juho Hänninen (FIN): ”A good weekend. The rally was very rough and hard in places, but I owe big thanks to my team, because the Fabia’s been working well the whole weekend. It’s a good result. It wasn’t easy, but we’re here. We have a strong position in the Championship now, but even my home rally in Finland won’t be easy. Fortunately for me, my team make difficult rallying like this much easier though.”
2nd – Bernardo Sousa (PRT): ”Finally the rally’s finished! Everything’s gone according to plan. Other than the driveshaft last night, it’s been a perfect weekend, no problems with the car. We will be in Finland for the first time on the next round, so my plan is to gain experience.”
3rd – Frigyes Turán (HUN): ”We are very happy. One of my dreams came true. Thanks for the experience, thanks to the Hungarian spectators who came here and thank you to the Greek organisers who made this happen. It’s a dream.”
