Sebastien Ogier leads Rally Australia following Sebastien Loeb's crash
Sebastien Ogier leads Rally Australia by 9.1 seconds after his Citroen team-mate and title rival Sebastien Loeb crashed out of first place on SS4
Loeb had taken the lead from Ogier by winning today's opening Shipmans stage. But early on the following Brooklana stage, Loeb rolled his car and had to retire. Even if he is able to rejoin under superally rules tomorrow, he will have picked up 35 minutes' worth of penalties for missing the rest of the Friday stages.
Rain this morning had allowed the Citroens to stay at the front of the field despite running first and second on what are traditionally dusty roads.
But they were also helped by errors from both works Ford drivers on Shipmans, with Mikko Hirvonen's trip wide off the road costing him 10s to the leaders, and Jari-Matti Latvala clipping the scenery and spinning.
Hirvonen is now 9.1s behind Ogier, while Latvala regained third from Petter Solberg (Solberg Citroen) by 0.2s when the Norwegian spun on SS5, Ulong. Latvala was quickest on that stage despite steering and bodywork damage to his Ford from his SS3 incident.
The three Stobart Fords fill fifth to seventh places. Evgeny Novikov is comfortably clear of team-mates Henning Solberg and Matthew Wilson, but half a minute adrift of the top group and ruing the weather that has prevented his lowly running order position from being an advantage.
Ken Block has already retired his Monster Ford, having gone off the road on today's opening stage.
Leading positions after SS5: Pos Driver Team/Car Time/Gap 1. Sebastien Ogier Citroen 37m34.6s 2. Mikko Hirvonen Ford + 9.1s 3. Jari-Matti Latvala Ford + 24.7s 4. Petter Solberg Solberg Citroen + 24.9s 5. Evgeny Novikov Stobart Ford + 57.3s 6. Henning Solberg Stobart Ford + 1m25.1s 7. Matthew Wilson Stobart Ford + 1m27.6s 8. Peter van Merksteijn Van Merksteijn Citroen + 2m16.4s 9. Hayden Paddon Symtech Subaru + 2m42.7s 10. Khalid Al Qassimi Abu Dhabi Ford + 2m42.9s
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