Nick Koan

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Full Story from wrc.com


Citroen's Sebastien Loeb admitted that he was pleased to have notched up his third win in a row and his fourth of the season in the Cyprus Rally, but said that he is now looking forward to exploiting the Xsara's rough gravel potential on the next two Mediterranean events and extending his already dominant 11-point lead in the drivers' standings.

Loeb took a record-equalling six wins on his way to the title last year, but has already notched up four this season with 10 rounds still to run. The Frenchman and his Citroen team have proved comfortable on all types of surfaces, but proved surprisingly invincible on what was declared on of the toughest Cyprus events ever. The rally's car-breaking nature took on new meaning this year as a host of leading drivers - including Loeb's close rivals Petter Solberg and Marcus Gronholm - were forced out of the event.

"It's a very good thing to have scored three wins in a row," he said at the post-event press conference. "It proves the strength of the Xsara, something that will be very important with the gravel rallies in Turkey and Greece to follow. It was amazing here in Cyprus, on very tough roads, that we had not one single mechanical problem.

"I actually felt the pressure from early on when I started to pull clear as I felt that I could only lose the event rather than win it. Looking ahead to the next two rallies, I don't know how competitive we will be, especially as I have no idea how well Petter and Marcus could have gone here because of their early departures from this event. We will just have to wait and see."

I3eXa

iTrader: (3)

It really bummed me out to have to see Petter pull just after the first (or was is the second) day...he was doing great considering his difficulties--running on 3 cylinders, his car going into limp mode, and getting no boost!