Sébastien Loeb ensures, Solberg punctures

The 29,89 km of the route linking Montauban-sur-l’Ouvèze to Eygalayes were not as significant as in 2009, when the special was covered in snow. If the weather conditions were rainy this morning, the weather developed favorably to offer a dry road free of ice this afternoon. Mikko Hirvonen (Citroën) once again proved to be the fastest and signed his second consecutive scratch by completing the course in 17'08"7, 2"9 better than his teammate Sébastien Loeb, who no longer has any reason to attack since he is more than two minutes ahead of his closest rival Dani Sordo (Mini).

The Spaniard finished 6"3 behind the reference time, being beaten by Evgenly Novikov (Ford) by nine tenths. The Mini driver is no longer under direct pressure from Petter Solberg (Ford), who lost a lot of time this morning following a poor choice of tires. The 2003 world champion drank the chalice to the dregs by puncturing on the SS13 course but still managed to limit the damage by failing 9"2 behind his direct rival. However, the Norwegian is now 1'06"8 behind when he reaches the Monaco parc ferme and he will have to be wary of attacks from Mikko Hirvonen, who is less than 24 seconds off the podium following his two consecutive scratches.

Evgeny Novikov secures his fifth after setting the third time of SS13, just 5” from the Flying Finn’s reference time. François Delecour (Ford) still occupies sixth position, more than two minutes from the top five. Pierre Campana (Mini) finishes the third day of the event one minute ahead of Ott Tänak (Ford). Note the very good place of Cédric Robert who currently occupies 16th position overall with a Citroën DS3 R3T and first place in the two-wheel drive cars.

The last step of Rally Monte-Carlo will feature four stages offering a total of 84,4 km timed. Sébastien Loeb will be the first to set off at 15:11 p.m. in the Col de Turini on the route linking Moulinet to La Bollène-Vésubie.

Discover in your AUTOhebdo magazine, currently on newsstands or available here, our guide WRC 2012 of 38 pages.