Citroen's
Daniel Sordo has taken the lead on the Rally Catalunya Costa Daurada following the middle loop on Friday.
Sordo lost ground to his team-mate,
Sebastien Loeb on SS3 - the repeat run through Querol and Seb increased his cushion from 3.7 seconds to 7.3 seconds. Dani put in a storming time on SS4 though and was 8 seconds quicker than the Frenchman, a result that pushed him up to P1 overall, 0.7 seconds up on Seb.
"I fitted harder tyres for this loop because I thought they'll be better for SS4 and it worked," said the Spaniard. "It is wonderful - first scratch and first time that I'm leader. We were very, very fast."
Loeb was also pleased, especially as Marcus Gronholm lost considerable time and is now 25 seconds back in third: "It went really well and I think my team-mate Sordo is doing great. The times are good and I'm ahead of Marcus, and that's what's most important," added the triple world champion.
Gronholm meanwhile for his part was not at all pleased after he only managed the fifth best time in SS3 and the sixth best in SS4. The Finn said tyre problems were to blame for his failure to be on the pace in Querol 2, but wasn't so sure why he was so far back in El Montmell 2.
"The tyre tread was too deep in SS3 and I was not able to improve on this morning's time," he noted. "I'm not happy because I'm not quick and I don't know exactly why that is."
Further down the order,
Mikko Hirvonen remains fourth, 12.9 seconds off his
BP Ford team-mate and a similar amount up on
Francois Duval. Mikko was happier in the repeat runs: "This run was better because the road has improved a lot," he explained, "and it's less dirty."
Duval was also in a better frame of mind and after his clutch problems were fixed in service A, he set some good times – winning SS3 and then posting the third best time in SS4 to move ahead of
Petter Solberg, who drops to sixth in his
Subaru.
