Day 1 Friday 170km, 8 stages. 2 remote services, about survival for the drivers.

Latvala extends his lead over Loeb by 3.2 on SS2. Hirvonen remains 3rd. Solberg moves from 5th to 4th but at stage end said that the Car doesnt feel good, big difference in how the car feels, doesn’t feel right in Right hand corners. Evgeny also moved ahead of Ostberg to 5th. Ostberg unhappy with the feeling and handling of the car drops to 6th overall.

On SS3 The top guys apart from Novikov on mixed compounds of tyres, Soft and hard. Mada Ostberg comes through with front left puncture. Mikko Hirvonen also with puncture, tyre alliterated, like Mads it happened in the last 2 – 3 Km’s of the stage, despite the puncture, The Fin somehow setting the 4th fastest time. Novikov comes through 7.2 sec slower than Hirvo. But Sebastien Loeb was on a charge in the last part of the stage, an pulled out 3.5seconds over his team mate Mikko. Then it was the Fords to come through. Rally leader Jari Matti Latvala comes through the stage, getting quicker towards the end to match the times of Loeb and is 0.1 seconds faster than the Frenchman at the finish. petter 0.2 behind Latvala, but putting him 3rd fastest, petter still struggling with the handling of the car.

Overall times

Latvala Leads
2nd Loeb +3.3
3rd Hirvonen +14.3
4th Solberg +17.5
5th Novikov +37.1
6th Ostberg +49.3
7th Tanak +1:15.1