Loeb heads a Citroen 1-2-3

With only the 1.5km sprint stage to run before midday service, Citroen C4 WRC driver Sebastien Loeb has been the class of the Rally Mexico field so far today.

Starting the day third, 27.5seconds off the lead, the Frenchman won each of the morning’s three countryside stages to return to Leon in first place, 16.6 seconds ahead of overnight leader Petter Solberg.

Running third through Saturday’s loose gravel stages, Loeb benefited from a cleaner racing line than Solberg and Ogier ahead - especially on SS10 and SS11. "I have the lead now and I’ll try to increase it but it’s not easy - this one didn’t clean as much as the others so it was hard to make a difference," Loeb said at the end of SS12.

"It was a good drive, with just a few little mistakes. I was on the limit at times. I will try to continue to increase the lead on the second passes but maybe I won’t be able to make as much of a difference. I’ll try," he added.

Running first through today’s stages, Citroen privateer Petter Solberg, also driving a C4 WRC, put a brave face on his time loss throughout the morning. "The first stage was very good actually, and on the second we didn’t lose as much time as we’d expected to, but the third was very loose," he said. "It was difficult to push because it was so slippery. First on the road isn’t easy but I know what I am doing. Now it will be interesting to see what happens this afternoon."

Citroen Junior Team driver Sebastien Ogier started the day in second, but lost the place to Loeb on the first stage. Two stages later, however, the Frenchman is less than two seconds away from stealing it from Solberg. "This stage was good," Ogier said at the end of SS12. "We were quite fast on the one before as well, but we had a spin and lost time. Everything is okay now. We have to continue like this."

Dani Sordo’s retirement on SS10 promoted BP Ford Abu Dhabi team drivers Jari-Matti Latvala and Mikko Hirvonen into fourth and fifth places respectively. But the pair lie more that a minute behind the Citroen trio, with Championship leader Hirvonen 1min 29sec off Loeb’s lead.

After SS12 Hirvonen said: "It felt better on that one but Loeb and Ogier are unbelievably fast - they’re getting away all the time. That’s it. I’m trying to go as fast as I can. On the last stage [SS11] I drove with a puncture for 15kms, so that didn’t help. Hopefully I can get through the rest without any mistakes."

Latvala, meanwhile, also had a mechanical problem to contend with. "We have a broken damper or a puncture - I don’t know - but something is wrong with the front-right," he explained. "I stalled, I lost a bit of time, but after that suddenly on a long straight I felt something went wrong with the front right and the car became really difficult to drive after that. We’ll definitely need to get this sorted, but I don’t know how much we can push any more, we are too far away."

But the morning wasn’t all bad news for Ford, who could take some consolation from the remarkable pace set by Stobart team driver Henning Solberg. The Norwegian had a brake problem on SS10, but found his mojo on the two which followed - going second fastest on SS11 and third fastest on SS12 in his Focus RS WRC. Henning holds sixth place overall.

Rally standings after SS13: