HAMILTON, New Zealand — World championship leader Sebastien Loeb slid off the road on the first special stage and incurred a 30 second penalty on the sixth to trail rival Mikko Hirvonen by 27.8 seconds after the first day of Rally New Zealand on Friday.
The Frenchman began the rally four points ahead of the Finn in the drivers championship and attempting to win for a second time in New Zealand to strengthen his challenge for a fifth consecutive world title.
As championship leader, Loeb’s Citroen was the first car on the road on the 24-kilometer opening stage, the first of 18 stages in the 11th round of the world championship. He was near the end of the stage when his car lost traction in deep gravel and slid from the road, conceding an early lead to his Ford rivals.
He finished the stage 5.9 seconds off the lead, third behind the Finnish pair of Jarri-Matti Latvala and Hirvonen, jointly leading Ford’s challenge for the manufacturers’ title.
After wins on special stages four and five, Loeb moved to second, only 0.7 seconds behind Hirvonen who had taken over the lead from his Ford teammate.
Just as he seemed poised to press Hirvonen for the overall lead, Loeb had engine trouble and was three minutes late to the startline for special stage six, incurring a 30 second time penalty.
Loeb won the stage by 3.3 seconds from Hirvonen but the penalty dropped him to 27.4 seconds behind the Finn on overall standings, two seconds ahead of Latvala who held third.
Hirvonen then took out the final 3.1 kilometer super special stage from Citroen’s Dani Sordo and Loeb to finish the day 27.8 seconds ahead of the championship leader. Sordo moved to third place, 30 seconds off Hirvonen’s lead and 0.1 second ahead of Latvala who dropped back to fourth.
Loeb said his slide on stage one showed the problems of starting first on the slick mud and gravel roads of New Zealand’s Waikato district, the rally headquarters.
“We went off at the end. It was a big moment,” he said.
“That’s why the last split time is really bad. We didn’t lose so much time but we were very lucky not to roll because the car went off the road and hit some big stones.”
Loeb’s first stage experience led to speculation his engine problems and late start on stage six might have been tactical, forcing leader Hirvonen to drive the stage first and also start day two Saturday sweeping the road for the other competitors.
Loeb was unable to start his Citroen C4, opened the bonnet and later pushed the car with the help of co-driver Daniel Elena.
“I just hit the starter button and it didn’t work,” Loeb said.
“We tried everything. In the end we rolled the car back, pushed it and finally got it going. It had nothing to do with tactics.”
Hirvonen did not think Loeb’s late start was tactical.
“I don’t know what was wrong, but Seb really did seem to have a problem,” he said.
“So tomorrow it looks like I’ll be first car on the road. Okay, it won’t be easy but we’ve found a good rhythm today, so we’ll see what we can do.”
Friday, at Hamilton, New Zealand. (After 7 special stages)
1. Mikko Hirvonen, Finland, Ford, 1 hour, 34 minutes, 44.3 seconds.
2 Sebastien Loeb, France, Citroen, 27.8 seconds behind.
3. Dani Sordo, Spain, Citroen, 30.0.
4. Jari-Matti Latvala, Finland, Ford, 30.1.
5. Francois Duval, Belgium, Citroen 1:27.9.
6. Urmo Aava, Estonia, Citroen, 2:01.3.
7. Petter Solberg, Norway, Subaru, 2:25.8.
8. Per-Gunnar Andersson, Sweden, Suzuki, 2:50.5.
9. Toni Gardemeister, Finland, Suzuki, 3:48.0.
10. Federico Villagra, Argentina, Ford, 4:47.5.
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