Sebastien Loeb wins Rally Argentina

Somehow, Sebastien Loeb has managed to win Rally Argentina and extend his championship lead to 13 points. After day one Loeb was hit with a 60 second time penalty, but he proved persistence pays off by ultimately claiming the lead on the final stage to earn a slender 2.4 second win over Ford driver Mikko Hirvonen.

Earlier Jari-Matti Latvala (Ford) and Sebastien Ogier (Citroën) looked likely victors only to surrender the lead. It was suspension failure for Latvala and Ogier crashed on the opening stage of the final day. While both men were able to finish the event, they will rue the opportunity lost.

Reflecting on his sixth win in Argentina, Loeb acknowldged his good fortune, “After Friday’s penalty I wasn’t counting on this victory. We pushed really hard to get back in contact with the front-runners and to beat Hirvonen. Once again the outcome was decided by a hair’s breadth. It seems that Rally Argentina is my happy hunting ground!”

Comeback kid Loeb wins in Argentina

Citroen’s Sébastien Loeb has, once again, defied the odds to win the latest round of the World Rally Championship, having written off a possible victory on the opening day of the Argentinean round at the weekend (26-29 May 2011) when the seven time World Champion was hit with a sixty second penalty, only to snatch victory on the very last stage of the event after an epic fight back – and some major problems befalling his rivals.

As Ford’s Latvala dominated day one on Friday, Loeb struggled first to match the pace of his rivals and then, when they checked into a time control early, a sixty second time penalty sent them back down the field. When Latvala suffered suspension failure, Loeb’s team mate Ogier took the lead and looked set to be at the wheel for what would be Citroen’s seventh consecutive win in Argentina.

The last day’s programme of Rally Argentina was an atypical with a stage of over 48 kilometres to be tackled as the sun rose. The crews had been up since 5h00 in the morning and they had a quick stop in the Villa Carlos Paz service park before battle began. They then set off for Ascochinga for the longest stage since the start of the season.

Sébastien Ogier and Julien Ingrassia, first out on the road; made a cautious start to nurse their 43.7s lead. In the final kilometre of the stage their Citroën DS3 WRC rolled onto its roof.

“A stupid mistake,” admitted Ogier at the finish. “All we had to do was to drive on to victory. I had noted an apex to be taken in a corner, and it ended in a roll. We were able to restart but the car was damaged. In addition to the superficial damage, we no longer had power steering. The windscreen was broken and we lost our rear wing.”

Sébastien Loeb and Daniel Elena in third place quickly realized that the nature of the terrain wouldn’t allow them to get the better of Mikko Hirvonen: “There was fog and it was very damp. In these conditions there’s no sweeping. Our first split times weren’t great. We had to go pedal to the metal to overtake.” The winner of the last five Rally Argentinas managed to snatch second place in the overall classification at the very end of the timed sector.

In the last three stages – some ten kilometers – Ogier tried to defend his position. Before the start of the Power Stage, he was only 3.3s in front of Loeb and 5.7s in front of Hirvonen: “It was really tough. In the last stage I felt that I wouldn’t be able to hold the wheel. Without power steering the car became incredibly heavy. We were totally unable to fight our corner,” summed up Sébastien.

While Loeb and Hirvonen took advantage of Ogier’s problems to overtake the Frenchman, he saved the points for third place: “It’s a lesser evil for the team. We haven’t lost too many points in the manufacturers’ classification. On the other hand, it’s not a great result for the drivers’ title chase. I’m really very disappointed.”

Loeb was in attack mode right till the very end and took over the lead from his team-mate. At the flag he was 2.4s in front of Hirvonen: “After Friday’s penalty I wasn’t counting on this victory. We pushed really hard to get back in contact with the front-runners and to beat Hirvonen. Once again the outcome was decided by a hair’s breadth. It seems that Rally Argentina is my happy hunting ground!”

Loeb congratulated his team-mate, and insisted on the fact that: “I understand what he must be feeling. I’ve had similar misadventures. It’s frustrating and disappointing but these mistakes can happen. Still he managed to bring the car home to the finish, and that’s very important for the team.”