Jordan Rally stage guides - Friday

On Friday, teams will tackle just six special stages and a total of 138.28 competitive kilometres, but two of those runs are through the punishing 41.45km Jordan River stage - one of the most difficult in the WRC calendar.

After a 0730hrs restart, drivers tackle two identical loops of three stages, split by a 30-minute midday service, before returning to the Dead Sea for the final overnight halt at 1631hrs.

Here are our wrc.com stage notes for Friday's stages. Under the summaries you'll find our list of essential website links to help you follow the rally via our live results service.

SS8/SS11: Suwayman - 10.49km
Unofficially known as the Dead Sea stage, this is officially the lowest sporting venue on earth. Starting at the banks of the Dead Sea which provides a stunning backdrop, the stage runs through the basin of the Jordan Valley and through the world’s lowest land point at 420m below sea level. It’s mostly flat and fast, with a hard surface and not much gravel to clear. There are a few exceptions, however, and the recent rains have left a few muddy sections. There is a particularly sticky patch at the 7.5km point. After that, there are a few short asphalt sections including one 1.2km stretch just before the finish. This year, organisers have added a little chicane here to slow the cars. Generally, there are lots of corners to cut so the cars further down the order might face some big rocks that have been dragged out onto the road.

SS9/SS12: Kafrain. 17.20km
Kafrain features sections which have been run earlier in the rally - so there could be rocks about here. From the start to the 3.5km mark the road runs alongside a dam, then opens onto a high-speed flat section with long, flowing corners. From 3.5km it tightens, gets twisty and goes uphill before the 4.7km point when it starts to flow better and widen until it hits the top of the hill and some tricky crests. Between 9.2km and 10.7km there's a short, sharp downhill section with lots of adverse camber corners which will be very tricky to brake for because of the amount of loose gravel. At 10.7km the road reaches the bottom of the valley and gets tight and twisty again. There's one more uphill section between 12.5km and 14.5km, before a final downhill sprint to the finish.

SS10/SS13: Jordan River. 41.45km
The extraordinary Jordan Rally stage follows the winding path of the river bed and runs adjacent to the border with Israel and through former battle fields. Traditional farming and Bedouin communities are aplenty and at 41kms, it is the longest stage of the rally and one of the longest in the championship. The road flows well for most of its length but it has a very dirty surface, so the first cars will do a lot of sweeping. The first 2.6km are fast and winds between trees - which makes almost all the corners blind. From there to 9.3km it heads though agricultural land - but with trees still lining the right-hand side of the road. Traction is especially tricky here, as the surface is a mixture of some almost completely clean sections and patches of deep gravel. The corners get tighter until the 10.5km mark, when the road dives back between the tress again and there are more blind bends. At 12.6km the road does a good rollercoaster impression as it heads into the Dolomite Hills, with undulating sections and a mixture of slow and high speed corners. It stays fast between 14.5km and 19.6km when it hits the plateau on top of the range and opens up with mainly fast corners mixed with some small crest and dips to throw the cars around. There is a twisty sector between 19.6km and 26.8km where the road is wide but the corners are blind again with big trees on the apexes. From there to the end it gets faster and more hazardous: there are lots of big rocks by the roadside waiting to be dragged on. The final few kilometres are very, very fast.

Source: WRC