WRC France Day 1

The big news in WRC this week is that Ford are considering pulling out next year after disagreements over plans to change the sport. One of the main changes being considered is increasing the number of rallies from 14 to 16. With Hyundai also taking a year's break next season it would leave only 5 manufacturers in the championship and just 10 cars with the new limit of just 2 cars per team.

But down to business and this years Rally of Corsica starts with Richard Burns still leading the championship by just two points from Citroen's Sebastien Loeb. After Burns� poor performance on the tarmac of San Remo two weeks ago the pressure is really on with both the Rally of France and the Rally of Spain being contested on tarmac before the finale in Great Britain on the 9th November.

During one of Thursday's practice sessions, Norwegian Petter Solberg crashed his Subaru forcing his mechanics to work for 14 hours straight to get the car ready on time for the start of the Rally. The days first two stages saw no real surprises with Carlos Sainz finishing stage one just under a second ahead of Richard Burns and only 7 seconds separating the top 8. Stage two saw Sebastien Loeb set a fastest time with Fords Markko Martin barely a second behind him and taking the lead from Carlos Sainz..

Although Mark Martin the co-driver for Sainz did leave their time card with the marshals at the end of stage two they realised the mistake and had time to go back and fetch it before the start of stage 3. The only real shock was the poor performance of tarmac specialist Gilles Panizzi who could not even make it into the top 8.

In stage three Markko Martin extended his lead in the Ford Focus with a fastest time for the stage while still complaining about the feel of the car and saying he had no confidence in it. Burns had a quiet stage 3 while his main championship rival Loeb finished second behind Martin to jump into second overall.

Before the start of stage 4 Petter Solberg had to get a new gear box for his Subaru after losing over 6 seconds in the previous stages. Francois Duval set the fastest time on stage 4 in his Ford while Sebastien Loeb took the overall lead after Markko Martin lost over 20 seconds by hitting some gravel and spinning just one corner from the end of the stage. Martin had to rely on spectators to push him back onto the track which left him 7th overall.

Markko Martin began his battle back to the front with a fastest time on stage 5, he was over 2.5 seconds faster than Loeb to move himself above McRae into 6th. McRae who is trying to set up his own team for next year is unhappy with his current form and says that the new style of rally car is not suited to his unique sideways style of driving.

On the final stage of the day, Markko Martin again set a very fast time to overtake Burns in 5th. While Duval continues to be quick in the other Ford and moved up to 2nd overall ahead of Marcus Gronholm.

Petter Solberg will be particularly happy after his mechanics rescued his weekend twice to put him in the final points position. But with rain forcast for Day 2, anything could happen. Rallye de France Day 1 | Day 2 | Day 3 | back