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Hanninen closes on Argentina victory

Juho Hanninen remains on course for Rally Argentina victory, having established a 45-second lead with just two full-length stages and a superspecial to go

Despite insisting he was now taking it easy, the Skoda driver still won all four stages this morning and continued to stretch away from Guy Wilks (Skoda UK), who remains second.

Any hope of Kris Meeke charging back onto Wilks' tail was swiftly dashed today when a sensor problem started afflicting the champion's Peugeot 207. The issue meant a lull before the throttle responded, and got increasingly costly as the loop went on.

That meant Wilks quickly pulled clear of Meeke, but the Peugeot UK man's third place still looks secure as the chasing Jan Kopecky (Skoda) realised too late that Meeke was in trouble, and did not raise his pace in time to challenge the wounded 207 for the final podium spot.

Federico Villagra felt his Ford Fiesta's engine was not functioning properly this morning and has now fallen behind top Group N driver Gabriel Pozzo's Subaru in their battle to be top local driver in fifth overall.

Definitely not functioning properly was Nasser Al-Attiyah's Skoda - the Intercontinental Rally Challenge newcomer got back up to 10th on today's first stage but stopped and retired when his engine drowned in a watersplash on the next one.

Pos  Driver             Car           Time/Gap
 1.  Juho Hanninen      Skoda       2h06m31.8s
 2.  Guy Wilks          Skoda          + 45.4s
 3.  Kris Meeke         Peugeot      + 1m51.2s
 4.  Jan Kopecky        Skoda        + 2m17.4s
 5.  Gabriel Pozzo      Subaru       + 4m40.6s
 6.  Federico Villagra  Ford         + 4m49.2s
 7.  Bruno Magalhaes    Peugeot      + 5m47.9s
 8.  Nicolas Madero     Mitsubishi   + 5m57.4s
 9.  Diego Dominguez    Mitsubishi   + 6m56.6s
10.  Claudio Menzi      Subaru       + 7m35.9s

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