76th Wales Rally GB - Citroën targeting the championship double in Wales

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True to tradition, the grand finale of this year's World Rally Championship will take crews to Great Britain for the Wales Rally GB, the 15th and ultimate encounter of the season which will settle the outcome of the 2008 Manufacturers' title chase. Having made sure of the Drivers' crown with Sébastien Loeb/Daniel Elena* in Japan, the Citroën Total squad is particularly fired up as it bids to seal the championship double. C4 WRCs have been entered for the five-time World Champions* and their Spanish team-mates Dani Sordo/Marc Martí. Two other C4 WRCs have been entered to contest the British round. They will be in the hands of Conrad Rautenbach/David Senior and of the recently-crowned Junior World Champions* Sébastien Ogier/Julien Ingrassia, and both will be prepared and run by PH Sport with the support of technical staff from Citroën Sport.

The majority of the route of this year's Wales Rally GB, which provides a little more than 348km of competitive action divided into 19 stages, will take competitors north of the Swansea-based service park, and features several notable changes compared with recent years. These range from a re-mix of familiar forest territory in Resolfen and classics such as Crychan run in the opposite direction, as well as a return to Builth Wells for the first time in eight years. Indeed, the format of this season's edition and its early-December slot inevitably conjure up images of RAC Rallies of the past and the lingering use of the event's former name will rarely have been more justified. For there is every chance that the fast, flowing forest tracks of the region will be as muddy as ever, and the possibility of frost and snow cannot be ruled out. Nor can fog, which has a tendency to move in over the Black Mountains and which would confirm the event's reputation as one of world class rallying's most awesome challenges.