Hyundai team principal Cyril Abiteboul will not ask Esapek Lapi to change his approach to next month’s Rally Croatia, despite his driver crashing out of last weekend’s Rally Mexico while leading.
Lapi had been locked in a thrilling battle with Rally Mexico winner Sebastien Ogier and was leading the rally after Friday’s stages, describing it as “one of the best days” of his career. However, in the first speed stage on Saturday morning, Lapi had a serious crash, which prevented him from continuing the rally.
Photo: Vladislav Maschl
Instead of publicly reprimanding Lapi, Abiteboul admitted that the team only expressed sympathy for him. The team manager does not believe that Lapi should change his approach in the Croatian rally.
“No, no, absolutely not,” Sirils Abitebols responded to DirtFish the question whether Lapi will be given any different instructions. “He has to go as fast as he can, and in fact on Saturday he said the crash happened because maybe he wasn’t going fast enough, making a one-millisecond error that led to the consequences we know.”
“He’s shown that he’s got the speed. He drove like that in Sweden, he did it in Mexico, and I think now we have to get him to materialize that ability. He’s got to keep doing what he’s been doing so far.”
