Pafos B service: More notes and quotes

Gronholm stalled on the start of SS4 with clutch problems and was worried that the car might stall in hairpins. In addition, he had a puncture three kilometres from the end of SS4.
(Subaru) - second, +8.2s: "Over SS3 and SS4 the Pirellis seem to be better than the Michelins and I can pretty much attack as I please."

(Hyundai) - third, +15.1s: "We had no tread left for SS4. It made it very hard under braking near the end. It's very hot, the roads are very hard and it's solid rock, which really kills the tyres. It's good to be this high - it's what I aim for all the time."

(Ford) - fourth, +16.2s: "It's all pretty fine. Third or fourth is a good position to be on the road for tomorrow, provided you're not too far off the leader. As it is now, it's nearly perfect."
McRae had a drama in the re-group before the service after SS4. His Focus refused to be fired up and had to be pushed into the re-group by McRae and co-driver Nicky Grist. The car was then pushed out by marshals, before being pushed into service by Ford mechanics. An ECU fault was diagnosed and the component changed.

(Ford) - fifth, +25.1s: "I drove off the road on the third stage, about 10m off the road, and had to drive back on through a field. After I'd gone off I thought I'd have a bit more of a go and pulled off the gear stick." The Frenchman completed the stage by pushing and pulling the connecting rod attached to the broken lever.

(Subaru) - sixth, +37.9s: "The side window was falling down, so we had a lot of dust in the car." In addition, an oil drip onto the exhaust made for a fairly smokey Impreza.

(Ford) - seventh, +55.2s: "There's a lot of tyre wear and a lot of crews are through to the canvas. Beingthe first car on the road now is not perfect. I suppose I get more wheelspin."
Sainz also reported that Makinen had gone off on a third gear right-hander under very hard braking.

(Peugeot) - ninth, 1m20.2s: "I have not got the perfect feeling. I seem to be fighting the car today and we have to take care with the tyres."



Toshio Arai (Subaru) is 11th overall, despite a spin in SS4. On SS2, the Japanese driver's engine overheated and went into one of its safe modes.

Armin Schwarz (Skoda) is 12th overall, but suffered major tyre wear in SS3. In SS4, a loose gearbox started activating the engine cut-out.

Bruno Thiry (Skoda) is 13th, but says he is having problems trusting his Octavia over the bumps. However, he now believes it is a suspension problem and not connected with the differential. The Belgian also suffered two punctures in SS3.

A frustrated Alister McRae (Hyundai) is wallowing in 15th, over six minutes off the lead, after a myriad of problems. The Scot lost his brakes 20km into SS3 and believes that his SS1 problems affected his suspension geometry. At the end of SS3, his Michelins were down to the canvas and after swapping them around for SS4, one burst in the stage.