DEAD SEA, Jordan — The fastest time on all 10 special stages enabled Qatar's Nasser Saleh Al-Attiyah and French navigator Matthieu Baumel to extend their overall lead in the FIA Jordan Rally to a comfortable 7min 32.1sec on Friday evening. The 12-time regional champion's new Ford Fiesta R5 Evo 2 never missed a beat over some of the most spectacular graded rallying terrain in the FIA calendar and the 10-time event winner was flying high at the lowest place on earth. "Steady, steady today," said Al-Attiyah. "No risks, no mistakes, just drive the new car and stay safe. On the stage, in Suwayma, I tried to go flat out so see if I could beat the time I set in the stage last year in the Skoda and I had the same time to the second..." The all-Jordanian crew of Marouf Abu Samra and navigator Malik Hariri earned a comfortable advantage in MERC 2 and held second overall at the end of the day in their Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution IX. Abu Samra had been embroiled in a tight tussle with Khaled Juma until his rival damaged his Mitsubishi's exhaust and lost three minutes putting out a small fire before the midday break. Juma recovered strongly over the second loop of stages. He passed Saudi Arabia's Rakan Al-Rashed to regain fourth overall and began to make in-roads into Meshari Al-Thefiri hold on third position. Only 50.1 seconds separated the pair at the end of the leg and Juma will be aiming for the last podium place Saturday. Kuwait's Essam Al-Nejadi held sixth position and Salem Al-Thefiri and Asem Aref were eighth and ninth overall behind Jordan's Ihab Al-Shorafi heading into a final stage that accounted for both Essam Al-Nejadi with overheating issues and Al-Rashed with gearbox problems. This promoted Salem Al-Thefiri to sixth place behind Al-Shorafi. Aref holds seventh place. Ahmad Shaban lost nearly 10 minutes in the dark on the super special stage on Thursday evening, but a string of impressive stage times catapulted the Jordanian into contention for victory in the 2nd National Rally. He trailed overnight leader Salaman Al-Gammaz by 2min 58.3sec. Ziad Miqdad was a distant third. The event is running thanks to a huge national effort supported by the Jordanian government and its security and safety services. It is also being supported by the private sector with the Hilton Dead Sea Resort & Spa, Dead Sea Touristic & Real Estate Investment (Samarah), Vestel, CCI – Creative Concepts Industries, Radio Hala and Bliss FM all playing a key part.
