Leg 3 am: Gronholm leads, Harri flies

Rovanpera, who started the day third overall, set fastest times on both SS21 and SS22 to leap-frog Subaru's Petter Solberg for second place.

Rovanpera's performance on the 28.65km Bannister South stage, the second test of the day, was particularly impressive. Not only did he move ahead of Solberg with a time a full 25s faster than the Norwegian, but he was also 11.3s faster than second quickest Gronholm.

Solberg's team-mate, Tommi Makinen, moved from fifth to fourth on the second stage of the day after Ford's Carlos Sainz rolled.

Although the Spaniard's car landed on its wheels, it suffered damage to the front bodywork and, crucially, damaged a turbo pipe. Sainz completed the stage, and his Ford mechanics will work on his car during the service halt before the next stage.

As a result, he lost almost one minute, but still holds a comfortable fifth place ahead of his team-mates, Estonian Markko Martin and Belgian Francois Duval.

Duval had marginally the better of his fierce battle with Martin, and holds a seven second advantage in the final points-scoring position despite briefly dropping to seventh after the first of the two stages run so far.

Skoda Octavia driver Toni Gardemeister holds eighth place, one minute behind Martin after a solid run through the two stages, with Rally Deutschland winner Sebastien Loeb, driving a non-factory Citroen Xsara, and Hyundai's Juha Kankkunen rounding out the top ten.