British aces prove their points

Burns scored his first points for Peugeot by finishing fourth, and just fell 8s short of overhauling third placed Carlos Sainz for a 206 WRC clean sweep.

"It was quite a difficult last stage," said Burns. "I was trying as hard as I could to catch Carlos without taking big risks. To get fourth is good because on the first day I didn't even think I would get out of that stage [when his engine intake became clogged with snow after an off]."

Alister McRae also scored his first points for his new employers, Mitsubishi, and did well to stay ahead of his charging brother on the final stage.

"I was committed but I also kept the car on the road," said Alister. "We've learnt a lot about the car here. And we've got a lot of new things to try before Corsica. I'm happy."

Colin McRae's chances of overtaking his younger brother were dashed when he spun on the final stage, and he fell 0.3s short.

"We had a high speed spin," Colin admitted. "The stage was in quite bad condition. We got kicked out of the rut, into a ditch and the car went around. It was as big a moment as I would want to have. We are disappointed not to get Alister, but we lost 18 seconds with the spin."