Frenchman Sebastien Loeb triumphed in a titanic struggle with Norwegian Petter Solberg to retain the lead by a whisker on the third day of the four-day Rally Australia in Perth today. Loeb, at the wheel of a Citroen, is well placed to secure his fourth rally win when the current contest ends tomorrow, strengthening his chances of clinching the world Rally drivers' crown for the first time.
Starting the day 3.9 seconds ahead of Solberg, Loeb handled his Xsara with consistent brilliance to finish with a 5 second advantage over the Subaru Impreza driver. Solberg drew level with Loeb on the second of the day's nine stages, but the ice-cool Frenchman, making light of treacherous, slippery surfaces in some of the Western Australian forest sections just outside the city, edged ahead by 5.4sec after the eighth leg.
Barring major incidents or mechanical failures on the final day, Loeb and Solberg seem certain to fill the top two places. Richard Burns (Peugeot), current leader in the world championship, lags 1min 25.8sec behind Solberg in third place, ahead of Estonian Markko Martin of Ford and Scot Colin McRae in a Citroen. Finland's four-times world champion Tommi Makinen is 2:20.9 adrift of the leader in a Subaru.
Rally Australia is the 10th event in the 14-contest rally calendar, with the remaining match-ups in San Remo, Corsica, Catalunya and Britain. Burns began the current rally with 49 points, five ahead of Spaniard Carlos Sainz (Citroen), with world champion Marcus Gronholm, of Finland (Peugeot) and Solberg, having 38 each, and Loeb and Martin, on 37 each.
Gronholm is out of the points reckoning after crashing his car into a ditch on the second day, losing more than 16 minutes and deciding to retire because he was too far back in the field to be a serious contender for points.
Filed by James Boylan
