Loeb edges closer to 2012 title

Sebastien Loeb took it very easy through an extremely wet final morning in France as he edged closer to claiming the 2012 World Rally Championship title.

Amid massive downpours and large amounts of standing water, Loeb carefully maintained a lead of 25.3 seconds over Jari-Matti Latvala’s Ford.

Loeb’s Citroen team-mate Mikko Hirvonen remains third.

The main action of the morning was Thierry Neuville’s progress. Citroen’s next star won all three stages as he continued to charge to make up for his Saturday penalty.

That took Neuville from fourth to sixth even before Dani Sordo lost the power steering on his Mini. With only a regroup, not service, before the concluding loop, Sordo is unsure whether he can continue.

Mads Ostberg struggled to match Neuville and Sordo in the wet and fell from fourth to sixth, before regaining fifth once Sordo hit trouble.

Evgeny Novikov lost seventh to M-Sport team-mate Ott Tanak when he rolled on Bischwiller-Gries, the day’s second stage. Fortunately the damage to Novikov’s Ford was not terminal and after some running repairs he continued in eighth place. Tanak had spun just before Novikov had his own incident.

Leading positions after SS19:
 
Pos  Driver              Team/Car          Time/Gap
  1.  Sebastien Loeb      Citroen         3h13m52.7s
  2.  Jari-Matti Latvala  Ford               + 25.3s
  3.  Mikko Hirvonen      Citroen            + 48.2s
  4.  Thierry Neuville    Citroen Junior   + 1m22.2s
  5.  Mads Ostberg        Adapta Ford      + 1m27.0s
  6.  Dani Sordo          Prodrive Mini    + 2m15.4s
  7.  Ott Tanak           M-Sport Ford     + 2m37.3s
  8.  Evgeny Novikov      M-Sport Ford     + 5m43.2s
  9.  Chris Atkinson      Italia Mini      + 6m31.5s
 10.  Martin Prokop       Czech Ford       + 8m30.2s
 

Source: http://www.iracing.com/inracingnews/world-rally-championship-news/wrc/loeb-edges-closer-to-2012-title

Keith Greene Masten Gregory Cliff Griffith Georges Grignard Bobby Grim