Gronholm ahead in Argentina

The Ford driver was elevated to the top spot when early leader Petter Solberg sustained a puncture close to the end of SS5. Solberg lost 14 seconds as he struggled to the end of the stage, falling to second.

He was then demoted to third by Sebastien Loeb in SS6. Championship leader Loeb had spun in today's first stage and fell to seventh, but was fastest through SS4 and SS5 and is now Gronholm's main challenger again.

Loeb achieved these times despite running first on the dusty roads, and admitted that he was helped by a little rainfall towards the end of the morning.

"It hasn't been easy but it rained a bit on this one so that was better for me than completely dry," said Loeb.

"I made a mistake in the first stage but since then I've been pushing hard. Marcus is very, very fast and so is Petter, so it's not easy."

Mikko Hirvonen has driven conservatively so far and holds fourth place ahead of Gigi Galli in the best of the privateer Peugeots.

Both OMV 307s hit trouble this morning. Henning Solberg had brake dramas early on, and Manfred Stohl broke a wheel in SS6, when running fourth ahead of Hirvonen.

Subaru's Chris Atkinson has also dropped down the order after losing time with some heavy landings over the jumps of SS5, and then being slightly delayed by the retiring Xavier Pons during the next stage.

After finishing on the podium in the past two events, Dani Sordo is currently only ninth in Argentina, having struggled with handling problems so far.

Leading results after SS6:

Pos  Driver         Make        Time
 1.  Gronholm       Ford        58:56.5
 2.  Loeb           Citroen     + 12.7
 3.  P Solberg      Subaru      + 14.6
 4.  Hirvonen       Ford        + 31.9
 5.  Galli          Peugeot     + 48.5
 6.  H Solberg      Peugeot     + 1:00.4
 7.  Stohl          Peugeot     + 1:04.0
 8.  Atkinson       Subaru      + 1:16.5
 9.  Sordo          Citroen     + 1:38.7
10.  Wilson         Ford        + 2:23.4
11.  Perez Companc  Ford        + 2:26.6
12.  MacHale        Ford        + 3:57.3
13.  Villagra       Mitsubishi  + 4:07.8
14.  Beltran        Mitsubishi  + 4:18.7
15.  Al-Attiyah     Subaru      + 4:51.1
16.  Omar           Subaru      + 5:05.7
17.  Menzi          Subaru      + 5:30.1
18.  Madero         Subaru      + 5:33.4
19.  Baldacci       Mitsubishi  + 5:44.0
20.  Teiskonen      Subaru      + 6:06.4