Loeb strikes again

Sébastien Loeb set best time on SS15 to extend his lead over Mikko Hirvonen to 21.7 seconds, heading into the 41.88km Otates 2 stage.

The Citroens continued to push on the 29.9km stage, while Jari-Matti Latvala suffered a puncture four kilometres into the stage, dropping behind factory team-mate Petter Solberg. Latvala has announced he is too far off the lead to challenge either Loeb or Hirvonen, but believes he can still fight Solberg for the podium. The two factory Fiestas are now separated by three seconds.

Loeb, who never passes him a chance to analyse a situation was impressed with Latvala’s capability to power on for 25kms with a blown tyre. The Frenchman also stated he can now control the situation and just keep one eye peered on his Finnish team-mate.

SS15
1 Loeb
2 Solberg +2.3s
3 Hirvonen +3.5s
4 Novikov +10.4s
5 Ostberg +16.4s
6 Al-Attiyah +18.1s
7 Atkinson +19.0s
8 Neuville +19.0s
9 Araujo +43.0s
10 Block +43.8s

TOP TEN OVERALL
1 Loeb
2 Hirvonen +21.7s
3 Solberg +2:12.2s
4 Latvala +2:15.2s
5 Ostberg+2:17.0s
6 Tanak +3:47.3s
7 Novikov +3:51.5s
8 Atkinson +4:41.3s
9 Al-Attiyah + 5:02.0s
10 Araujo +7:34.4s