After a ceremonial start in Hamilton on Thursday evening, the opening leg heads south-west and includes two passes over the 43.88km Waitomo stage – one of the longest in the championship.
The second leg is based north-west and is the longest of the rally. The super special stage at Mystery Creek, which surrounds the service park, has been moved from the end of the day to the middle of the leg.
The final leg hugs the Tasman Sea coastline and includes a remote service zone at Raglan. The highlight is two passes over the classic Whaanga Coast test, regarded as one of the best in the entire championship, before ending with a third pass over the Mystery Creek test.
There are 18 stages in total, covering 353.56km in a route of 1255.98km.
Last year:
Marcus Gronholm won the Rally NZ in 2006 leading from start to finish in his Ford Focus RS WRC.
He eventually finished just under a minute up on his team-mate,
Mikko Hirvonen, while Manfred Stohl completed the podium, albeit more than 1.5 minutes further back.
Xavier Pons and Dani Sordo rounded out the top five, followed by
Petter Solberg and
Luis Perez Companc. Jari Matti Latvala took the final point in eighth – and the Production Car WRC win.
A number of drivers’ had problems during the event and retired, most noticeably
Subaru #2 driver
Chris Atkinson, who went out on day 2 after hitting a rock and damaging the suspension on his Impreza.
Stobart Ford’s
Matthew Wilson also hit a rock on the first leg and retired after damaging his engine. He re-started under the SupeRally on the Saturday though and eventually finished in 13th place overall.
