I pushed very hard in both stages, says McRae.

After yesterday's rain and fog, clear blue skies returned over the Mediterranean island of Corsica as the 43 remaining competitors began the third and final leg of the Tour de Corse, third round of the FIA World Rally Championship.

Today's action followed a simple format - two groups of two special stages covering 112km south of Ajaccio.

Ford Rallye Sport drivers Colin McRae and Nicky Grist made a perfect start to post fastest time on the opening 24.21km test from Penitencier Coti-Chiavari to Pietra Rossi, one of the rally's classics, which features the climb of the Col de Cortone. Their Ford Focus RS World Rally Car was quickest by 4.3sec to power ahead of Philippe Bugalski (Citroen) into fourth place.

Team-mates Carlos Sainz and Luis Moya were fourth fastest and they slashed their deficit to Bugalski to just 3.2sec. The Frenchman retaliated on the following 31.79km Pont de Calzola - Agosta Plage but McRae arrived in service 7.0sec ahead with Sainz only 8.5sec behind.

"I pushed very hard in both stages," said McRae. "We had good lateral grip in the corners so the car didn't slide too much but conditions were quite damp and tricky under the trees. It should be drier next time through. We lost a little time in the second half of the second stage which is very twisty but there's all to play for now."

Sainz described the roads as "dry in places, damp, slippery and tricky in others" but stressed that his choice of medium compound dry weather Pirelli rubber was right. "We'll see our gravel crew now and decide what to do for the final two tests," he said.

Markko Martin and Michael Park climbed to tenth in their Focus and closed the gap to Armin Schwarz to just 0.4sec. The 26-year-old Estonian driver is suffering from a heavy cold and struggling to hear co-driver Park's pace notes but is still attacking.

An impressive performance by Francois Duval and Jean-Marc Fortin ended 5km from Agosta Plage when a tyre exploded on their Focus RS, throwing the car off the road and into retirement. Duval excelled on only his second rally in a Focus and was tenth.