Saturday midday wrap: Loeb fends off Hirvonen

Citroen team-mates Sebastien Loeb and Mikko Hirvonen remain locked in battle at the head of the Brother Rally New Zealand field at the halfway point of leg two.

Loeb initially looked like he had the speed to pull away and swiftly put an end to the lead fight, as after only two stages on Saturday morning his advantage had grown to eight seconds.

But it took just one strong stage time from Hirvonen to wipe out almost all of that lead again, as the Finn’s pace on the final stage of the morning loop brought him back to within 1.7s of Loeb.

The squabbling Citroens are still nearly a minute and a half clear of the leading Ford, which is now the recovering Petter Solberg in third place. The Norwegian has been firmly on the pace this morning, quickly claiming third from Evgeny Novikov and then edging away a little. Novikov’s main task will now be keeping his M-Sport Ford team-mate Ott Tanak behind him.

It has been an uneventful day so far for Thierry Neuville (Qatar Citroen) and Dani Sordo (Prodrive Mini) in sixth and seventh places. Jari-Matti Latvala has been flying in eighth place, yet seems to be too far behind to catch any of the drivers ahead, with a gap of two minutes even to Sordo.

A damper problem cost Armindo Araujo time and saw his Mini start to come under a hint of pressure from the increasingly confident Ken Block’s Monster Ford.