Gronholm leads opening morning

Sebastien Loeb can clinch his third consecutive title this weekend if he scores eight points more than Gronholm, but the Ford driver's present form suggests that he will keep his championship hopes alive for one more round at least.

Gronholm lost a little momentum in SS3 when his vision was obstructed by large amounts of dust inside the car and inefficient windscreen wipers. He also had water temperature worries in the long Asinou 1, but still managed to go quickest and then doubled his advantage in the following stage. He leads by 17.9 seconds going into the first service.

"The car is good," he said. "On the previous long stage I had a little bit of trouble with water temperature which maybe took a little bit of power and made it difficult, but now it seems to be okay."

Loeb has encountered the worst of the dusty and slippery conditions as he is running first on the road.

"It's very difficult, a lot of loose gravel," he said. "But it's okay, I didn't lose too much time. I've done my best but Marcus seems to be very fast."

The normal balance of power has already been established, with Gronholm and Loeb dominating, and Ford number two Mikko Hirvonen now back in his habitual 'best of the rest' position.

Hirvonen lost ground with a confidence-sapping error early in the opening stage, but has now reclaimed third from the very impressive Toni Gardemeister, who is driving a 2002-vintage privateer Citroen. Intermittent gearbox gremlins cost Gardemeister some time in SS4, leaving him five seconds adrift of Hirvonen.

Although Manfred Stohl dropped back from this battle with a quick spin in Kato Amiantos 1, he remains fifth.

Petter Solberg's seemingly never-ending string of problems continued with a puncture in SS1, a jump start penalty in SS2, plus a lack of traction, brake issues and concerns about overheating. Yet somehow the Norweigan took a remarkable stage win in SS4, moving up to seventh - just 0.2 seconds behind his gripless teammate Chris Atkinson - in the process.

His elder brother Henning Solberg had a similar experience in SS4 - laughing hysterically when he saw that he managed to go fourth quickest through the stage with a broken driveshaft.

Dani Sordo lost a lot of time initially as he struggled to get to grips with the slow and twisty stages on his first visit to Cyprus. Indeed he was outshone by teammate Xavier Pons, back for the first time since being ousted from Kronos' second points-scoring Xsara in favour of Sordo, until Pons spun in SS3. Prior to that incident, Pons had held fourth place, but he fell to 11th, while Sordo has progressed to eighth.

The WRC field was boosted by the return of the Red Bull Skodas this weekend, but their presence proved to be fleeting, with both Harri Rovanpera and Andreas Aigner stopping with electrical problems after SS1. They may return under SupeRally rules tomorrow.

Leading positions after SS4:

Pos  Driver        Make         Time
 1.  Gronholm      Ford      53:24.7
 2.  Loeb          Citroen    + 17.9
 3.  Hirvonen      Ford       + 44.5
 4.  Gardemeister  Citroen    + 49.5
 5.  Stohl         Peugeot    + 56.6
 6.  Atkinson      Subaru   + 1:06.5
 7.  P Solberg     Subaru   + 1:06.7
 8.  Sordo         Citroen  + 1:14.3
 9.  H Solberg     Peugeot  + 1:19.3
10.  Wilson        Ford     + 1:51.2