Sainz takes historic win

While Peugeot's Harri Rovanpera celebrated winning the final stage of the rally in Argentina, it was Citroen's Sainz who was getting all the attention as he came to terms with his staggering achievement.

"It's a big honour for me to get this win," he said. "But it's not so much the number as the way it was won. Records are nice to have but a good victory is even better. I won here 13 years ago, and two years ago, and the fact that I'm winning again is more important than the number. I'd like to thank the team and Michelin. The car was great, and I'm really happy to be part of this.

"I was trying not to think of victory, and driving at this rhythm is difficult," he admitted about his final day caution. "It's not natural and sometimes even harder than pushing. I listened to all the noises, I carefully looked at the dashboard and paid attention to any possible smell. Of course I also had to avoid the stones and drive cautiously on the bumps."

Team-mate Sebastien Loeb was second to make it a Citroen one-two boosting Loeb's lead in the drivers' championship to 17 points and giving the French manufacturer a 27 points lead in the constructors' chase.

"Before the rally, I thought I had a chance of beating Carlos," said Loeb, "but it was soon clear on the second day that I didn't. I was driving very well, but I did the same times as Carlos and not better, so I decided to save myself and get the points for the championship."

Sainz's finishing time was a massive 1m33.5s quicker than his team-mate's, but it masks what was a toughly-fought charge by the Spaniard who had battled with Peugeot's Marcus Gronholm for much of the rally until the Finn was forced to retire towards the end of the second leg.

It was Sainz's consistency in the early stages that ultimately gave him victory, that and the fall of his major rivals in the first two days.

Ford's Markko Martin was the first to hit trouble, in a big way too. The Estonian was driving flat out on a straight towards the end of SS5 when his take off on a jump went badly wrong as he launched into the air hitting the ground nose first before barrel-rolling down the gravel track. Both he and co-driver Michael Park miraculously walked away from the wrecked Ford but were later taken to hospital for precautionary checks.

"I have some problems with my eyes," Martin said, "but I feel very lucky to be able to walk away from an accident like that. I knew when we were in the air over the jump that it was going to be bad, but it was far worse than I expected. It was my mistake, and one that came from the recce.

"It was a new stage and, with only two passes over the road in practice, I didn't pick up the rock that we landed on. My line was about half a metre wrong and that was costly."

Solberg managed to last a few stages more than Martin, his retirement less dramatic than his Ford rival, but equally as damaging in terms of championship points, or rather the lack of. The Norwegian was hit once again by watersplash problems that blighted his efforts in Turkey last month.



Solberg lost eight minutes to the leaders on SS9 after stopping early due to an ill-fated encounter with the stage's watersplash, the same one that caught him out earlier in the day. A fire at the end of the stage though finally brought his rally to an end. Solberg rejoined the rally the next day under the new SupeRally system but was forced to retire after suffering an oil leak on the road section between SS14 and SS15.

With Martin and Solberg out of the way, it became a two-way fight between Gronholm and Sainz as Loeb dropped back, unable to match the pace of the duo in front despite taking three stage wins.

Gronholm took the initiative first with a string of stage wins in the first of of the second leg. But after lunch Sainz launched his fightback as he notched up three consecutive stage wins with Gronholm retiring on the third of Sainz's wins after clipping a rock. What seemed like a simple error was actually a race-ending misjudgement with the right front wheel having been ripped off the Peugeot machine.

What was a lead of 12.9s for Sainz over his nearest challenger Gronholm became a 1m37s cushion over his team-mate Loeb who had been promoted to second spot. With such a lead Sainz eased off and let gravel specialist Rovanpera, Hirvonen and Loeb trade stage wins.

Francois Duval rescued Ford's rally with third spot overall ahead of Hirvonen and Rovanpera, who did the same for Subaru and Peugeot. Argentine driver Luis Perez Companc gave his home crowd something to cheer about with an impressive sixth place overall in the Bozian Racing Peugeot 206.

Mitsubishi's Gilles Panizzi took seventh despite losing a stack of time on the first leg with gearbox and turbo problems. Gabriel Pozzo rounded out the top eight in the Subaru Impreza Sti.