Mikko Hirvonen is five seconds adrift of Sebastien Loeb as the battle for top honours on Neste Oil Rally Finland continues.
Finnish hero Hirvonen, in a Citroen DS3 WRC, was 1.5s quicker than his French team-mate, the winner of the FIA World Rally Championship title for the last eight seasons, to narrow the gap between the top two drivers.
“I was sure I had a puncture,” said Hirvonen. “There were lots of rocks on the road and I was going wide in places and hit a big rock on one corner. We’re just going flat out.”
Loeb, meanwhile, revealed he has been struggling with a mechanical issue since the end of the previous stage: “I have a problem with the rear diff since the stage before,” he said. “It overheated and we lost the oil. It was handling really strange and we were sliding everywhere. We lose a bit of time and I wasn’t sure if we could complete the stage at one point.”
Jari-Matti Latvala was the leading factory Ford driver, 0.2s down on Hirvonen. “It’s the first time we are not losing anymore, we have a chance to keep the fight on. You never know what is happening in this rally so we have to keep pushing.”
Mads Ostberg blamed set-up issues for his failure to close the gap to fourth-placed works Ford pilot Petter Solberg. Chris Atkinson’s hopes of a point-scoring finish on his return to the WRC appear to be over after the Australian hit trouble 10 kilometres into the run in his Citroen after he went off the road. Jari Ketomaa’s frustrating day continues due to a persistent engine misfire. The Finn remains in eighth overall ahead of countryman Matti Rantanen.
Sebastian Lindholm reported a significant time loss running first on the road through the loose surface gravel in his privateer Fiesta: “This was definitely the most slippery stage we’ve done so far. I was all over the road and all of the time getting nowhere.”
Armindo Araujo, in the lead WRC Team MINI Portugal entry, also lost time forging a clean line through the loose surface gravel.