Sébastien Loeb and Daniel Elena are still in front in Rally Finland after a hotly-disputed second leg. They lead theirteam-mates Sébastien Ogier and Julien Ingrassia by 1.6s!
The very long final day promises an epic batle between the two Citroën Total World Rally Team drivers and Finn Jari- Matti Latvala, as they all have only a single aim – victory in one of the most prestigious rallies in the FIA World Rally Championship.
It was no surprise to see that the sprint, which began on Thursday, continued throughout the long leg.
The crews covered 671,72 kilometers in almost 14 hours between Jyväskylä and Lahti, 134,60 of whichmade up the timed stages.
Sébastien Loeb and Daniel Elena, who started this morning with a lead of 2.8s over Sébastien Ogier andJulien Ingrassia, had to open the road on the day’s eight stages. The seven-time world champions foundconditions to their liking in the damp portions, especially in Evo (SS5), and this helped them fend off theirrivals. But they had to clean the trajectory as soon as the roads grew drier. “It wasn’t quite as big a handicapas in other events, but obviously you lose time,” explained Loeb. “This was proved by Mikko Hirvonen’sperformance. He started far back, and thanks to better road conditions he set a string of fastest times.”Sébastien Ogier matched his team-mate’s pace all day long and took the lead in Hyväneula 2 (SS9), whichhe covered at an average speed of 129 km/h!
Like the end of the first day the last stage gave the leaders a chance to reshuffle the cards. Loeb received a10-second penalty for checking in a minute late on purpose at the start of Mynnilä (SS11). Ogier, whostarted behind him, decided to drop 13.4s to finish second 1.5s behind his team-mate. In third came Jari-Matti Latvala, 2.6s further back.
“We tried to do something to sow doubt in our rivals’ minds,” summed up Loeb. “It didn’t work, but it hasn’treally made our task a lot more difficult. We’ve still got a long leg to do. Since the start we’ve managed tomatch the pace of our rivals even though we’re first out on the road. I just hope that I won’t have to do evenmore sweeping tomorrow on the very dry stages.”
“Everything’s still up for grabs,” underlined Ogier in turn. “Since yesterday, the positions at the start haven’thad a big influence on the performances. Nobody’s managed to make the break. Tomorrow, I think we’regoing to meet more difficult conditions. We’ll have to push like crazy. Everybody knows these stages. It’sgoing to be a ding-dong battle, and in my opinion Jari-Matti Latvala is in the best position.”
The last leg of Rally Finland will start Saturday morning at 7h00 with 11 stages (140,05 timed kilometers)on the day’s programme. The two Citroën drivers will be out to inflict a sixth defeat on the Finns in 38Finnish rallies counting for the World Rally Championship.
