2010 FIA WORLD RALLY CHAMPIONSHIP - RALLY SWEDEN - 14.02.2010

Mikko Hirvonen and Jarmo Lehtinen claimed victory in the opening round of the FIA World Rally Championship, Rally Sweden. The Finns’ 42.3 second victory underlines their determination to overhaul Sébastien Loeb after narrowly missing out on the world title by just one point last year. Loeb and co-driver Daniel Elena finished second, giving up on the fight this morning in favour of solid points. Jari-Matti Latvala and Miikka Anttila took the final podium position. The final day of competition covered five stages and 101.05 competitive kilometres. Hirvonen started with a 16.6 second advantage over Loeb and while the Frenchman was fastest in the first stage, he only managed to close the gap by two-tenths of a second. After the following stage, which Hirvonen won, Loeb admitted defeat and simply drove to the finish to secure points for second position. Similarly, Latvala was too far adrift to challenge and with a comfortable cushion to fourth placed Dani Sordo, he also had little to gain by pushing to the limit. Overall, the top of the leaderboard remained unchanged, with the top 10 crews claiming points in the opening round of the series. After a disappointing one-off return to the Championship, Marcus Grönholm finished 21st, and Kimi Räikkönen arrived back in Karlstad in 29th position. The Finn, who is contesting only his second WRC event and first in a World Rally Car, gained confidence throughout and even set a top six stage time.

Rally Sweden – Results - 1. Mikko Hirvonen/Jarmo Lehtinen - 2. Sébastien Loeb/Daniel Elena - 3. Jari-Matti Latvala/Miikka Anttila - 4. Dani Sordo/Marc Marti - 5. Sébastien Ogier/Julien Ingrassia - 6. Henning Solberg/Ilka Minor - 7. Matthew Wilson/Scott Martin - 8. Mads Östberg/Jonas Andersson - 9. Petter Solberg/Phil Mills -10. P-G Andersson/Anders Fredriksson