WELLINGTON, 19 April 2004 — World champion Petter Solberg edged out Finland’s Marcus Gronholm by 5.9 seconds to win the New Zealand Rally for Subaru yesterday after a neck-and-neck battle for the lead.
Ford’s Estonian Markko Martin, winner of the previous Mexican Rally, finished 25.6 seconds off the Norwegian’s lead in third place to move a point clear of Citroen’s Sebastien Loeb in the championship after four rounds.
The victory was Solberg’s first of the year and it came after the Norwegian hit a rock and lost his lead to Gronholm before the Peugeot driver spun on the penultimate stage of an action-packed final leg.
The two had swapped places several times on the gravel roads over the past two days but the 16.3 seconds the Finn had to make up on the final stage proved too much.
Pushing as hard as he could, Gronholm’s time on the second and final run through the scenic Whaanga Coast stage south of Auckland was 44 seconds quicker than Loeb’s winning time in the morning.
However, Solberg played it safe and completed the stage 10.4 seconds slower than Gronholm to secure the win.
France’s Loeb, who won the first two rallies of the season and had been level with Martin at the top of the standings before New Zealand, finished fourth.
Martin leads the drivers standings on 26 points with Loeb on 25, two times world champion Gronholm on 24 and Solberg 23.
Ford stayed top of the manufacturers’ standings with 47 points, nine clear of champions Citroen. The Estonian also had a big scare on the penultimate stage, hitting a bank on one side of the road during a very fast section and bouncing across to the opposite side of the road where he hit the other bank.
Finland’s Harri Rovanpera and Spain’s Carlos Sainz finished fifth and sixth respectively while Mikko Hirvonen brought the second Subaru home to claim seventh spot.
The final drivers’ championship point went to Daniel Carlsson in a non-works Peugeot despite the Swede going off for six minutes on the last stage.
The next event is in Cyprus from May 14-16.
