Solberg seals his hat-trick
Solberg seals his hat-trickGreat Britain - Subaru - Petter Solberg - 19/09/2004 14:47:58
Ford’s Markko Martin won the final stage by a whisker from team-mate Francois Duval, but the happiest man in Cardiff was Subaru’s Petter Solberg who sealed his third Rally GB victory in a row with the third best time on the final stage of the event.
Sebastien Loeb’s fourth-quickest time confirmed his second place, which keeps him 28 points ahead of Solberg – the reigning world champion - in this year’s drivers’ championship standings with just 40 points left to gain over the remaining four rounds.
Martin had really put the hammer down in his Ford to deprive team-mate Duval of a clean-sweep of victories on the 2.5km Cardiff Docks superspecial by a scant 0.1s. Both drivers eclipsed the earlier times on the stage, which was a little drier than it has been before. The Estonian takes third place on the rally and the Belgian fifth.
Solberg and Loeb set the third and fourth best times, with French Peugeot privateer Nicolas Vouilloz an excellent fifth in his Bozian Racing 206. He finishes ninth overall.
Carlos Sainz in the Citroen was sixth best on the stage and fourth overall, while Skoda’s Toni Gardemeister and Bozian Peugeot runner Hening Solberg tied for seventh best time. Solberg is 11th overall, while Gardemeister is well down the field after his long off yesterday.
Subaru’s Mikko Hirvonen and Peugeot’s Harri Rovanpera also set identical times – ninth best – and that means that Rovanpera seals sixth place and Hirvonen seventh. Manfred Stohl was only 13th on the stage, but the Austiran Peugeot 206 driver takes the final drivers’ championship point in eighth place overall.
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