Gronholm wins in Cyprus
/dnl.eurosport.com/sd/img/placeholder/eurosport_logo_1x1.png){kind=logo}
ByEurosport
Published 16/05/2004 at 14:14 GMT
Finland's Marcus Gronholm of Finland moved to the top of the world championship rankings with victory at the Cyprus Rally on Sunday. The Peugeot driver was 54 seconds ahead of main challenger Sebastien Loeb, of France, for his first win of the year with E
Eurosport
Image credit: Eurosport
Gronholm, world champion in 2000 and 2002, only just managed to pull through the Cyprus test after his Peugeot 307 developed gearbox problems. He heads the overall standings with 34 points, one more than Citroen's Loeb. Mexico rally winner Martin is third on 32 points.
Gronholm began the day with a lead of 22.9 seconds over Loeb and almost doubled it by winning the first two stages of the day to ease his passage to his first win of the season and the maiden win for the Peugeot 307 WRC.
"It is a small miracle that we made it to the finish at all," said Gronholm. "The gearbox was on its last legs and I had to change gear very gently each time. I knew that Harri (Rovanpera) had gearbox problems as well, so I was careful."
Citroen's Sebastien Loeb managed to hold on to second after claiming victory on five of the 18 stages, edging out Ford's Markko Martin who was more than satisfied with his third position as it means he will have a better starting position at the next round in Greece and it maintained Ford's lead in the constructors championship
Carlos Sainz finish fourth for Citroen, ahead of the second Peugeot 307 WRC of Harri Rovanpera with defending World Champion Petter Solberg fighting back to sixth after dropping to eleventh early on day two with an overheating problems on his Subaru Impreza WRC.
"I'm still disappointed about the radiator problem," Solberg conceded. "But, without that it would have been a perfect rally. We should have had more points but I'm still pleased to take something away. As far as the Championship goes, there are still plenty of rounds to go this year - so I'm focusing now on better fortunes in Greece."
Scan me
Share this article
Advertisement
Advertisement