Loeb takes early lead in Spain

The Frenchman, who won every stage to capture victory in last weekend's Rally de France, was 10.1 seconds faster than Peugeot's Marcus Gronholm in the first Catalunya stage in Querol and 7.3 seconds faster than Duval in the second stage at El Montmell.

Ford's Roman Kresta caused a minor surprise to end the second stage third fastest overall, as the Blue Oval aimed to build on Toni Gardemeister's second placed finish in Corsica.

Gronholm ended the second stage fourth overall in the classification, after a disappointing drive through El Montmell which was 19.8 seconds adrift of Loeb's best.

Gardemeister was fifth overall at the end of Stage Two, ahead of Subaru's Petter Solberg and Mitsubishi's Gigi Galli.

Peugeot's Nicolas Bernardi had his rally get off to a disastrous start when he made a mistake after opting for a rain-biased tyre - which proved unsuitable as the rain did not fall as heavily as he had hoped.

He slid off the road on Stage One on his way to setting the ninth best time, and was 47.1 seconds adrift in stage two.

Standings after SS2:

Pos  Driver        Make          Time   
 1.  Loeb          Citroën       26:43.5
 2.  Duval         Citroën     +    17.6
 3.  Kresta        Ford        +    25.9
 4.  Grönholm      Peugeot     +    29.9
 5.  Gardemeister  Ford        +    37.5
 6.  Solberg       Subaru      +    38.9
 7.  Galli         Mitsubishi  +    51.0
 8.  Hirvonen      Ford        +    54.8
 9.  Bengue        Skoda       +    59.6
10.  Sarrazin      Subaru      +  1:16.4
11.  Bernardi      Peugeot     +  1:23.4
12.  Rovanperä     Mitsubishi  +  1:26.1
13.  Atkinson      Subaru      +  1:40.6
14.  Schwarz       Skoda       +  1:43.2
15.  Kopecky       Skoda       +  1:43.6
16.  Wilks         Suzuki      +  2:45.0
17.  Boland        Ford        +  3:41.6
18.  Katajamaki    Suzuki      +  3:43.9
19.  Martinez-Saco Subaru      +  4:05.3
20.  Weng          Mitsubishi  +  5:00.2

All Timing Unofficial