RallyRACC Catalunya

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The Citroën Total World Rally Team's flag-to-flag domination of this weekend's RallyRACC Catalunya was rewarded by the outfit's third one-two finish of the season. Thanks to their sixth win of the year, Sébastien Loeb and Daniel Elena have succeeded in closing to within a single point of Mikko Hirvonen in the 2009 Drivers' standings, while second place for Dani Sordo and Marc Marti handed Citroën sufficient points to wrap up the firm's fifth Manufacturers' world crown. The outcome of the Drivers' title chase will be settled on Rally GB (October 23-25).

Sébastien Loeb and Dani Sordo ended Saturday's action split by just 1.5 seconds and in a strong position to fulfil the mission they had been given by Olivier Quesnel before the start. Before any celebrations could begin, however, they still had two attempts at today's loop of three-stages west of Salou to tackle, and neither driver had any intention of easing up out of a desire to stay one hundred per cent focused, savour today's six tests and entertain the huge crowds which lined the stages.

Indeed, Dani Sordo kicked off the last day with the best time on SS13 (Riudecanyes). It was then Sébastien Loeb's turn to top the timesheet on the short La Serra d’Almos test (SS15) which enabled the five-time World Champion to return to the day's first service area in Salou with a cushion of 2.3 seconds at the top of the leaderboard: "I've above all been concentrating on not cutting the corners so as to reduce the risk of puncturing. There's no point in trying to gain a few tenths of a second when there's not really any need. I will be just as cautions this afternoon, too, because the stages will probably be quite soiled second time round…"