SS5
Al-Attiyah shaved just 1.2 seconds off his opening run through Ar-Rusays but it was enough to win the stage by 1.5 seconds and enabled the Qatari to increase his lead over Al-Rawahi to 13.7 seconds.
Bakhashab stopped on a long right-hander near the end of the stage for 30 minutes and his demise lifted Al-Atya into third and MERC2 leader Jweihan into fourth place.
Al-Marri extended his advantage over Al-Muhannadi to 22.5 seconds in MERC3.
Al-Ofi beat Al-Harthy by 4.9 seconds to the stage win in the National Rally and moved into a 4.8-second lead.
SS6
Al-Attiyah was seven seconds faster on a clean re-run of Ar Rassah and that pace was sufficient for his lead to grow to 18.1 seconds.
Sheikh Bader Al-Fayez had struggled with a misfiring engine from the start and stopped before the halfway point of the stage.
Jweihan maintained his Rally 2 lead but dropped time to Al-Aamri for the second stage in a row.
SS7
Al-Attiyah safely negotiated the last stage of the loop, despite a slow puncture, and returned to Sohar with an overnight advantage of 41.2 seconds after Al-Rawahi also punctured and dropped 23.1 seconds to the 20-time regional champion.
Al-Atya held on to take third but Ihab Al-Shorafa crashed out of contention midway through the special.
Jweihan stopped at the scene of Al-Shorafa’s accident and dropped 28 minutes on the stage with Al-Aamri taking the lead in MERC2. The Jordanian was reliant on event officials to reimburse his time after the stage was cancelled for remaining international and national crews.
Quotes from Sohar – after SS7:
Al-Attiyah said: “We kept up the pace. Two slow punctures during the day but we tried to manage. Still a long way to go but we will try and change some things on the car now for Qatar and Jordan to try and understand a few extra things.”
Al-Rawahi said: “Unfortunately, we had a flat tyre on the last stage. We had a rock on the line. We didn’t actually make a mistake but my luck was not great. We will see tomorrow. It’s another day. We will still keep on pushing. Coming from an injury, I am not 100% ready physically but I did not want to miss my home rally.”
