Podio tutto Volkswagen a Monte Carlo

Sébastien Ogier and Julien Ingrassia led a clean sweep of the Rallye Monte-Carlo podium for Volkswagen Motorsport this afternoon, the French double World Champions winning the event by nearly one minute. Team-mates Jari-Matti Latvala and Miikka Anttila exceeded their own expectations with second overall and Andreas Mikkelsen and Ola Floene claimed third in only their second outing in this legendary FIA World Rally Championship event.

Today’s route, based around Monte-Carlo, took in just three stages, the second running of the Col St Jean to St Laurent test counting as the Power Stage. Here, Citroën’s Kris Meeke and Sébastien Loeb claimed first and second respectively while Latvala collected one additional point for being third fastest through this single stage. In the FIA World Rally Championship for Manufacturers, Volkswagen heads Hyundai, M-Sport and Citroën.

Ogier was able to control his pace at the front of the field today, such was his advantage, and the Polo R WRC driver romped to his second consecutive WRC Rallye Monte-Carlo victory. Before the event, Latvala had hoped for a result in the top four, such has been his previous record in the world’s oldest rally, so the Finn was delighted to claim second. Mikkelsen has similarly had a strong event and the Norwegian has barely put a foot wrong over the four days of competition. Mads Østberg came home as the lead DS 3 WRC driver in fourth, following problems experienced by Loeb and Meeke earlier in the event. The two did however set the stages alight today, Meeke winning two stages and Loeb one to finish eighth and 10th respectively in this season-opening event. Dani Sordo and Thierry Neuville had a titanic battle to the finish and while Sordo held the initial advantage, the young Belgian overhauled his team-mate in the final stage to take fifth by just eight-tenths of a second. Elfyn Evans recovered from yesterday’s suspension damage to take seventh, and Martin Prokop finished ninth after being overhauled by Loeb. Robert Kubica was the only leading retirement of the day. After a fine event, with a number of fastest stage times, the Pole’s Fiesta RS WRC lost its brakes over the flying finish of the penultimate stage and crashed into a wall.

The FIA WRC 2 Championship was won by Stephane Lefebvre and Stephane Prévot, while the Junior WRC Championship win was secured by Quentin Gilbert and Renaud Jamoul, both driving Citroens.

The second round of the FIA World Rally Championship takes the contenders to the snowy forests of Sweden for the only true winter event in the calendar (12-15 February).