Stohl also had a problematic event, struggling to re-gain his confidence after his off in Spain. The Austrian was running just outside the top ten until fuel pressure problems in SS11 cost him over 10 minutes.

At least he finished though, his team-mate, Francois Duval was not so fortunate. Duval looked well set to take fourth until he started to suffer from brake and gearbox problems in the final two stages on Saturday. Although he completed both tests he had to retire on the road section back to service. He did not re-start on Sunday.

Stobart Ford's Matthew Wilson also failed to get to the end after he lost drive in the penultimate stage. He had been running tenth.

As for Nicolas Bernardi, who was giving the new Suzuki SX4 WRC car its first outing in the WRC, he got to the end, albeit having had to SupeRally twice. He was classified in 31st place.

In the FIA Junior World Rally Championship category, Martin Prokop took the victory in his Citroen C2 S1600, 12.5 seconds up on Jozef Beres.

Yoann Bonato completed the JRC podium, on his first outing with a Citroen C2 S1600. The Frenchman was extremely impressive and set the pace in the Junior class in every single test on Saturday. He also won another two stages on Sunday.

Per-Gunnar Andersson and Arnaud Augoyard completed the JRC top five, the former doing more than enough to take the Junior crown.

P-G had been locked in a fierce battle with his Suzuki team-mate, Urmo Aava for the JRC title, but when the Estonian crashed out on SS8 on day 2 while leading, the pendulum swung firmly in the Swede's favour.

The WRC now takes a short break, before continuing at the end of the month in Japan.