Ogier relieved to still be in rally

The Frenchman ended the day in sixth place, having run second to Sebastien Loeb through the morning. He dropped one minute off the road, but said it could have been much worse.

"It was my mistake," Ogier said. "I thought the corner was a left-five, but it was a left three. This means I was in fifth gear when I should have been in third gear.

"We went straight off the road, I had too much speed. I didn't understand the note. Julien [Ingrassia, co-driver] called it right, but I didn't hear it right.

"I reversed and was able to get back to the road, but there are many places where I wouldn't have been able to come back. It was also good that there were no trees at the side of this place in the road. I'm lucky, sometimes when you go off the road on an asphalt rally there is no chance to come back."

Ogier admitted, other than his excursion, he was happy with the way his third asphalt WRC round in a C4 was going.

"Other than that, yes, it was a good day," he said. "I made some changes to the car at lunchtime and the car felt better in the afternoon. We still have a long way to go in this rally and it would be nice to make up some places, but to make the podium would be very difficult."

Ogier is 54 seconds behind third-placed Petter Solberg.