Preview: Rally Argentina.

The Rally Argentina is the sixth round out of 14 in the 2002 FIA World Rally Championship. The tricky gravel track is in the rolling hills to the west of the famous Argentine plains, with there being an ever-present danger of hitting damaging rocks lying in the road. It is a high altitude rally, with stages going over 2000 metres above sea level. Entries closed with 82 crews, making it the biggest entry in the championship this year.

Team Peugeot Total go to Argentina as the out right leaders of the championship, with a whopping 68 points - nearest contenders Subaru and Ford have just 27 points each. Peugeot are entering four cars in the rally; usual drivers - Richard Burns, Marcus Gronholm and Harri Rovanpera plus a fourth works car, for Gilles Panizzi.

Argentina is the last rally planned for the 2001 version 206 World Rally Car before the 2002 version is launched at the Acropolis Rally. With the 2001 car, Peugeot has scored four successive one-two results to date. Peugeot is the only currently active team who also contested the first ever FIA World Championship Argentine Rally, in 1980. Their highest placed driver was Jean-Claude Lefebvre, in fifth place. Lefebvre is still working with the team, now in charge of the team's press work.

The Subaru World Rally Team will be using their ex-Catalunya cars updated to 2002 spec. Just Tommi Makinen and Petter Solberg will be entering the Rally. Since Cyprus Solberg has been in USA on promotional work, including making a personal appearance at the SCCA Rim of the World Rally in California. ''Never in my life have I been asked to sign so many autographs!'' Seven Subaru cars finished the rally in the top ten, headed for the third consecutive time by (and beating all the works cars) a privately run version driven by David Higgins.

Ford, who are equal in points with Subaru will be entering three cars; Carlos Sainz, Colin McRae and Markko Martin. Investigative work after Cyprus shows that most of Ford's steering troubles were caused by damaged racks rather than power steering trouble. Team Principal Malcolm Wilson: ''They were caused by impact damage. For Argentina, we have selected conservative car specifications. We need more points on the board.''

A Good omen for the team is that the record stage times for all the relevant stages used on the first two days are held either by Carlos or Colin

Marlboro Mitsubishi Ralliartare in fourth position going to Argentina. Francois Delecour and Alister Mcrae will compete, but there will be no third entry at this event.

Ralliart has also been analysing problems experienced in Cyprus. Team Director John Easton: ''We have fitted new design driveshaft couplings for this event, because we are not sure why these failed in Cyprus. Alister's eventual transmission failure was because of an earlier impact which moved the cross member by two inches (5cm)''.

Following the Hyundai team's first outing on gravel in Cyprus, considerable research is in hand to improve the consistency of shock absorber performance before Argentina. A team spokesman explained; ''When we can resolve this, we know the handling of the car will also improve. We know there is still a lot more performance to come out of the Accent WRC3''. Armin Schwarz, Freddy Loix and Juha Kankkunen will be driving.

Skoda have their work cut out as they are still yet to score points. Their drivers will be Kenneth Eriksson, Toni Gardemeister and Gabriel Pozzo - Pozzo is being nominated for championship points for the first time.

David Sutton, whose team usually runs Pozzo's car: ''Everyone was disappointed when Pozzo's plans for 2002 were threatened earlier in the season. It was very gracious that Stig Blomqvist relinquished his drive to let Gabriel drive the third official car in Argentina''. It is the first full works drive on a World Championship Rally for an Argentine rally driver since Jorge Recalde's Lancia entry on this event in 1992, ten years ago!

Citroen are not entered into the Argentine Rally, but their test team is moving on from Greece (where temperatures were too cold for useful feedback) to make tests in Argentina before the rally, on roads not this year being used for the event. Both Thomas Radstrom and Sebastien Loeb will then be making the official pre-event reconnaissance.

In the Production Car World Rally Championship, ten of the 11 drivers remaining on the series who nominated Argentina as one of their six qualifying events hope to start: Natalie Barratt has advised the FIA she has withdrawn from the series. There are only two Italian teams present. Top Run (Ligato Evo VII, Baldini and Manfrinato in Evo VIs) and Nocentini (Trelles and Ferreyros in Evo VIIs) will enter but Ralliart Italia never planned to take part. Subaru Group N development news: Arai's Cyprus problem was a fuel supply failure. Prodrive engineers are now redesigning the faulty pieces which led to Laukkanen's gearbox trouble on the Pirelli Rally. Since the Cyprus Rally, joint series leader Karamjit Singh contested the opening qualifying round of the FIA Asia-Pacific Championship in Canberra as defending champion but retired with gearbox failure on his Proton Pert. Czech driver Valousek suffered extensive damage to his Evo VII in Cyprus and will have to rent a car from Pro Racing in Argentine Evo VI instead. Current standings are: Sohlberg, Ferreyros, and also Singh 10 points. 14 drivers have already scored points.

Unusually there are no 'works supported' World Rally Cars entries on this event. Most of the top local drivers have entered in Group N cars, including Luis Perez Companc who led the Group N category in Cyprus and 2001 Codasur champion Federico Villagra. 2001 Argentine champion Gabriel Raies, however, is working on this event as Companc's manager. Claudio Menzi and Esteban Goldenhersch have withdrawn on financial grounds.

Although Cyprus for various rules also counts as a non-European event, Argentina is the first event fully held outside Europe. There are various implications. On these events different rules apply in regard to pre-event testing and special transport facilities are arranged. Also, private drivers do not need to use FIA control fuel.