Subaru’s Petter Solberg has taken an early lead in the Rally of Argentina, topping the timesheets after the first two runs through the Villa Carlos Paz superspecial stage.
Subaru’s Petter Solberg has taken an early lead in the Rally of Argentina, topping the timesheets after the first two runs through the Villa Carlos Paz superspecial stage.
The Norwegian’s first run was 0,3 seconds faster than that of Peugeot’s Marcus Gronholm, but, although he could only manage the third-quickest time on the repeat run behind Ford’s Markko Martin and Citroën’s Carlos Sainz, the defending world champion led the Estonian overall by two-tenths of a second.
Martin, third on the first run, was second overall (two tenths of a second ahead of Gronholm) and the Finn sealed his third position with the second-fastest and fifth-fastest times.
Sainz, fourth on the opening test and second on the second, took fourth place overall, ahead of Citroën team-mate and current drivers’ championship leader Sebastien Loeb, who was 2,3 seconds behind after the two stages.
Peugeot’s Harri Rovanpera and Ford’s Francois Duval were evenly matched after the two runs and 3,7 seconds behind Solberg in sixth and seventh positions.
Subaru’s Mikko Hirvonen was a further second behind in eighth and Mitsubishi’s Gilles Panizzi was ninth overall, 11,6 seconds behind the leader. Panizzi’s Mitsubishi team-mate Kristian Sohlberg rounded out the top 10, a further four seconds off the pace.