Loeb establishes dominant lead

"I have a good feeling for the car, it's going well, and I don't take too many risks to do those times," said Loeb.

"It's better to have a good lead. You never know, you could stall the engine, have a spin, so it's better to have a bit more gap."

Although Loeb's unstoppable progress has removed all tension from the lead battle, a superb contest continued for second place, initially between Chris Atkinson and Mikko Hirvonen, before the resurgent Marcus Gronholm charged into contention.

Hirvonen was five seconds quicker than his Subaru rival in SS9 and moved 1.2 seconds ahead in the overall standings. But Atkinson fought back in the next stage, closing to within 0.1 seconds of Hirvonen again.

Then in Derramadero 1, both men were thoroughly upstaged by Gronholm. After a frustrating first day, the championship leader mounted a comeback on leg two. He quickly moved clear of sixth-placed Manfred Stohl, then drove remarkably through SS11 to pass Dani Sordo, Atkinson and Hirvonen, and emerge in a shock second place, having gained three positions in 23kms.

"The feeling is better with the car now," said Gronholm. "Now I'm happy with the speed (compared) with the rest after Loeb."

His pace left teammate Hirvonen reeling, although the Rally Norway winner is only 0.1 seconds behind Gronholm as the cars head for service.

"He's really found his rhythm now," said Hirvonen, who struggled in SS11. "We had some problems in the start and then very nearly went off in one corner. But I'm surprised Marcus went that fast. We have to push now."

Atkinson was also troubled, having slipped from second to fourth.

"Not fast enough," he grimaced at the end of Derramadero. "It felt alright, but the time's not there."

Although Gronholm is still 57 seconds behind the dominant Loeb, his progress had certainly got the champion's attention.

"I think Marcus woke up today..." Loeb joked at the end of SS11. "He's now second, so we have to control him.

"For the championship, for sure it's better if Marcus is a bit more behind. But I didn't understand yesterday why Marcus was not faster than that, and I think today he understands again what the problem was.

"Luckily I have a good gap now."

Leading positions after SS11:

Pos  Driver     Make              Time
 1.  Loeb       Citroen     2h 15:30.6
 2.  Gronholm   Ford            + 57.6
 3.  Hirvonen   Ford            + 57.7
 4.  Atkinson   Subaru        + 1:00.7
 5.  Sordo      Citroen       + 1:07.0
 6.  Stohl      Citroen       + 1:44.5
 7.  Latvala    Ford          + 2:55.7
 8.  Wilson     Ford          + 7:38.5
 9.  G MacHale  Ford          + 7:55.2
10.  Higgins    Mitsubishi   + 11:46.5