Kevin Abbring and Pieter Tsjoen wrote the story of this 53rd edition of the Ypres Rally. At the end of this stressful proof, the Peugeot 208 T16 R5 take off a beautiful victory. The second in Belgian rally season for the young Dutch, after the Wallonie, the first for him in the City of Cats. For Pieter Tsjoen, allready winner in the Westhoek as river in 2001, he add a victory as co-driver at his palmares.
After a strong start signed Thierry Neuville (Hyundai i20 R5) Friday evening, the WRC driver made a mistake in the 6th stage, making some barrels. Constrained to retirement, the Sankt-Vith driver of Monaco restart Saturday to ensure the show, and signed some scratches at same time.
Neuville out, it's the French Bryan Bouffier (Skoda Fabia R5) that took the lead, with a little advance of 14"6 on Kevin Abbring. Saturday morning, at the jump of Kemmelberg, Bryan Bouffier was too optimistic and break the motor mount. He leave the service, but after the gearbox was changed, the trouble continued.
From this moment, Bryan Bouffier would sound the burden, but the new leader Kevin Abbring doesn't let him do. Bouffier comes back at 4"1 of the Dutch before the last stage, but the Peugeot driver hit head, and won with 8 seconds good on the Skoda!
Behind Abbring and Bouffier, Vincent Verschueren (Skoda Fabia R5) signed his second carreer podium at Ypres, and finished also as best Belgian.
Bernd Casier (Ford Fiesta R5) signed his fifth 4th place at Ypres, after his podium last year. He win the Tour European Trophy classification before Giandomenico Basso (Hyundai i20 R5), 7th overall.
The best British, winning his classification and the Tony Pond Trophy, was Keith Cronin (Ford Fiesta R5), who has avoided the errors, in contrary of his competitors David Bogie and Fredrik Ahlin (Skoda Fabia R5), both off road.