Hirvonen Takes Lead in Rally Portugal

Mikko Hirvonen knows that he has to mark his comeback into the 2010 WRC title fight at some point this season, and the gravely roads of Rally Portugal should provide him with a good opportunity to score his second win of the season and close the gap to championship leader and main rival Sebastian Loeb in the standings.

His start on Thursday was statement enough that he means business, as he scored the best time in the first superspecial stage of the event, at Algarve Stadium. His early lead in Rally Portugal is not very significant – only 0.1 seconds ahead of 2nd placed Federico Villagra – but he did manage to cross the finish line some 1.5 seconds ahead of Loeb, which could only boost his confidence for the rest of the weekend.

“It's really nice to win a stage like this. It's a good start, but tomorrow is a different day. I'm going to take it easy and steady, with no panic, and see how it goes,” said the Ford driver after yesterday's stage.

Citroen completed the quads with privateer Petter Solberg and works driver Dani Sordo, the latter attempting to win his first ever event in a Citroen C4 WRC. They were 0.7 and 0.8 seconds off pace respectively, while followed by Stobart's Henning Solberg one tenth of a second behind.

Citroen Junior's Sebastien Ogier had to settle for 6th overall, exactly one second behind leader Hirvonen, but still ahead of Stotart's Matthew Wilson and reigning world champion Sebastien Loeb. The Top 10 was completed by two of the most important rookies in the series, Kimi Raikkonen and Ken Block.

The Friday action will start from 9.30 AM local time, with the 22.72 km SS2 Santa Clara 1, the first of 6 stages to be ran tomorrow.