Latvala closes on Swedish victory

The scheduled repeat run through the Ullen stage this afternoon has been cancelled due to poor road conditions, as the stage had mostly turned to gravel after the first passage early this morning.

More snow remains in the following Lesjofors and Rammen stages so these are set to run as planned.

"The first stage in the morning had quite a lot of gravel, but Lesjofors and Rammen had quite nice conditions," Latvala told reporters at the end of SS17. "I've been really enjoying the driving and have a relaxed feeling."

The leader had to reassure the Ford squad in SS17 after his second-placed teammate Mikko Hirvonen radioed to express his concern about the marks Latvala had been leaving in the snow banks.

"It's a very narrow road and it was quite slippery, so I was sliding from one snow bank to the other," Latvala explained. "He was wondering why there were so many holes in the banks when there was only one car ahead of him..."

Latvala remains almost a minute clear of Hirvonen, with Stobart Ford's Gigi Galli in an equally comfortable third place ahead of Petter Solberg (Subaru).

Although Galli will be delighted to claim his second ever WRC podium just two rallies into his comeback with the Stobart team, the Italian admitted that cruising to the finish today was not a pleasurable experience.

"I know how important this result is for us and for the team," Galli said. "To be honest, I cannot enjoy (the stages) a lot. But I'm trying to drive as safely as I can."

The battle for fifth between Stobart Ford's Matthew Wilson and Ramsport Ford driver Andreas Mikkelsen initially looked like it would be settled in the British driver's favour, as Wilson edged away from Mikkelsen in this morning's first two stages.

But Wilson's poor run through Rammen allowed Mikkelsen to narrow the gap to just seven seconds by the end of the morning.

"We just had a slow start," Wilson said after SS17. "I think the end was okay, but we were just asleep at the start and lost too much."

Despite closing to within striking distance of Wilson, Mikkelsen said he was keen not to jeopardise his first WRC points finish by pushing too hard to catch the Stobart driver.

"Of course I want to try and take Matthew, but I have to think that I've never been in the points before," he said. "It's something new for me to be in sixth place and it's very good. But we'll definitely try."

Dani Sordo (Citroen) and Toni Gardemeister (Suzuki) continue to hold seventh and eighth places, ahead of the Production class leaders.

Having rejoined under the Superally system after crashing out of third position yesterday, 18th-placed Henning Solberg has monopolised the stage wins this morning.

Subaru privateer Mads Ostberg is mounting a similar charge. He went off the road when running an impressive sixth on Saturday and is now 13th, but was third-fastest in Lesjofors today.

Leading positions after SS17:

Pos  Driver        Car         Time
 1.  Latvala       Ford        2h29:41.5
 2.  Hirvonen      Ford        +    55.6
 3.  Galli         Ford        +  2:03.1
 4.  P Solberg     Subaru      +  2:57.8
 5.  Wilson        Ford        +  5:05.1
 6.  Mikkelsen     Ford        +  5:13.0
 7.  Sordo         Citroen     +  7:04.6
 8.  Gardemeister  Suzuki      +  9:56.9
 9.  Hanninen      Mitsubishi  + 10:58.5
10.  Ketomaa       Subaru      + 12:05.6