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Meeke closes on Curitiba victory

Kris Meeke (Peugeot UK) is closing on victory in the Rally of Curitiba, having continued to edge away from nearest challenger Guy Wilks (Skoda UK) on the final morning

The gap between the two Britons is now up to 35.4 seconds, with both aiming to maintain their positions and have a conservative run to the finish.

"It's really pretty good at the moment - I'm just trying to stay on the road and take no chances," said Meeke.

Meeke and Wilks are now under no threat from the factory Skodas as Jan Kopecky sustained a puncture on today's first stage, dropping him to within range of team-mate Juho Hanninen, who had the same problem yesterday. Hanninen was fastest on all three stages this morning and has now taken third from his team-mate.

Bruno Magalhaes remains a lonely fifth, while fellow Peugeot driver Daniel Oliveira has fallen back behind the best of the Group N cars after sustaining a puncture of his own.

Today's itinerary has been truncated by poor weather, with a heavy thunderstorm overnight causing river levels to rise substantially. That forced the cancellation of this morning's run through Rio Pesqueiro, with a decision due shortly on whether the stage will be safe to use later on today, when it is scheduled to run as SS12.

The final superspecial has also been changed to a demonstration run as the weather prevented the crews from reaching it for a recce, so the last timed stage will now be SS14 - which could be one of only two stages on the final loop if Rio Pesqueiro is canned again.

Pos  Driver           Car           Time/Gap
 1.  Kris Meeke       Peugeot     1h20m57.0s
 2.  Guy Wilks        Skoda          + 35.4s
 3.  Juho Hanninen    Skoda        + 1m31.9s
 4.  Jan Kopecky      Skoda        + 1m44.3s
 5.  Bruno Magalhaes  Peugeot      + 3m31.5s
 6.  Eduardo Peredo   Mitsubishi  + 11m13.7s
 7.  Eduardo Scheer   Mitsubishi  + 11m36.6s
 8.  Daniel Oliveira  Peugeot     + 12m16.4s
 9.  Rafael Tulio     VW          + 14m47.1s
10.  Juan San Martin  Subaru      + 18m54.5s

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