Rally Argentina 2009

 Rally Argentina 2009

Racing data
5th of 12 races of the 2009 World Rally Championship
Surname:	Rally Argentina
Date:	23-26 April 2009
Begin:	Cordoba - Villa Carlos Paz
Exams:	23 tests over 331.80 km
Distance:	1533.65 km
Covering:	gravel
Podium
First:	Sébastien Loeb Citroën World Rally Team
Second:	Dani Sordo Citroën World Rally Team
Third:	Henning Solberg Stobart VK M-Sport Ford Rally Team

The 2009 Argentina Rally was the 29th and fifth round of the 2009 World Rally Championship . The rally consisted of 23 special stages and was held from April 23 to 26.

Race report

Sébastien Loeb and co-driver Daniel Elena (Citroën) had won the Rally Argentina for the fifth time in a row and had their fifth victory in the fifth rally of the season. At the end of the rally, Loeb had a lead of over 1:13 minutes over team-mate Daniel Sordo . Henning Solberg (Ford) finished third on the podium. He was more than four minutes behind the winner Loeb. At first it looked as if Loeb could face resistance from his opponents in Argentina. He finished the first day in third, maybe a bit tactically, in order to have a better starting position on Saturday. On Saturday he took the lead, but Ford driver Mikko Hirvonen was able to keep the gap to Loeb small. The tide turned in the 15th special stage when Hirvonen had to give up the rally with a radiator damaged. Jari-Matti Latvala was out on Sunday after taking third place from Hirvonen. In the first test on Sunday he had problems with the fuel pressure and lost almost eight minutes. Latvala finished sixth in the end. Because of Latvala's bad luck, Petter Solberg (Citroën) took third place, but his dream of a podium did not come true. One test later, he also had fuel pressure problems and had to give up. Brother Henning Solberg (Ford) thus slipped to third place on the podium. From this point on, all drivers had to survive the last kilometers of the rally to the finish. Loeb had doubled his lead over Hirvonen in the world championship to 20 points and was thus a step closer to the sixth world championship title in a row.

Classifications

Bottom line

Item	driver	Co-driver	automobile	time	Residue	Points
WRC
1	Sébastien Loeb	Daniel Elena	Citroën C4 WRC	3: 57: 40.3		10
2	Dani Sordo	Marc Marti	Citroën C4 WRC	3: 58: 53.4	1: 13.1	8th
3	Henning Solberg	Cato Menkerud	Ford Focus RS WRC	4: 01: 44.4	4: 04.1	6th
4th	Federico Villagra	Jorge Perez Companc	Ford Focus RS WRC	4: 03: 40.0	5: 59.7	5
5	Matthew Wilson	Scott Martin	Ford Focus RS WRC	4: 03: 51.2	6: 10.9	4th
6th	Jari-Matti Latvala	Miikka Antilla	Ford Focus RS WRC	4: 07: 30.3	9: 50.0	3
7th	Sébastien Ogier	Julien Ingrassia	Citroën C4 WRC	4: 18: 35.4	20: 55.1	2
8th	Nasser Al-Attiyah	Giovanni Bernacchini	Subaru Impreza N14	4: 20: 51.9	23: 11.6	1
PWRC
1 0(8)	Nasser Al-Attiyah	Giovanni Bernacchini	Subaru Impreza N14	4: 20: 51.9		10
2 (10)	Marcos Ligato	Ruben Garcia	Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution X	4: 23: 04.8	2: 12.9	8th
3 (12)	Toshi Arai	Glenn MacNeall	Subaru Impreza	4: 27: 27.9	6: 36.0	6th
4 (16)	Spyros Pavlides	Chris Patterson	Subaru Impreza N14	4: 45: 10.4	24: 18.5	5
5 (18)	Eyvind Brynildsen	Denis Giraudet	Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution IX	4: 52: 49.9	31: 58.0	4th
6 (21)	Gabor Mayer	Robert Tagai	Subaru Impreza	5: 00: 56.3	40: 04.4	3
JWRC
1 (14)	Michal Cosciuszko	Maciek Szczepaniak	Suzuki Swift S1600	4: 42: 28.0		10
2 (15)	Aaron Burkart	Michael Koelbach	Suzuki Swift S1600	4: 44: 08.7	1: 39.9	8th
3 (17)	Alessandro Bettega	Simone Scattolin	Renault Clio S1600	4: 50: 02.0	7: 33.2	6th

Special stages

Day	WP number	WP name	length	WP winner	time	leader
Day 1 (April 23)	WP1	Estadio Córdoba I	2.4 km	Sébastien Loeb	2: 23.6	Sébastien Loeb
Day 2 (April 24th)	WP2	La Cumbre - Agua De Oro I.	14.94 km	Jari-Matti Latvala	12: 48.7	Jari-Matti Latvala
	WP3	Ascochinga - La Cumbre I.	22.38 km	Dani Sordo	14: 44.1	Dani Sordo
	WP4	Capilla Del Monte - San Marcos I	22.95 km	Petter Solberg	17: 33.5	Mikko Hirvonen
	WP5	San Marcos - Charbonier I	9.61 km	Sébastien Loeb	6: 32.5
	WP6	Ascochinga - La Cumbre II	22.38 km	Dani Sordo	14: 26.8	Dani Sordo
	WP7	Capilla Del Monte - San Marcos II	22.95 km	Mikko Hirvonen	17: 16.8	Mikko Hirvonen
	WP8	San Marcos - Charbonier II	9.61 km	Sébastien Loeb	6: 28.9	Dani Sordo
	WP9	La Cumbre - Agua De Oro II	14.94 km	Jari-Matti Latvala	12: 32.4
Day 3 (April 25th)	WP10	El Mirador - San Lorenzo I	20.81 km	Sébastien Loeb	11: 28.0
	WP11	Mina Clavero - Giulio Cesare I	22.79 km	Sébastien Loeb	18: 18.2
	WP12	El Condor - Copina I.	16.29 km	Sébastien Loeb	13: 04.6	Sébastien Loeb
	WP13	Icho Cruz - Carlos Paz I	9.73 km	Sébastien Loeb	6: 19.4
	WP14	El Mirador - San Lorenzo II	20.81 km	Mikko Hirvonen	11: 22.0
	WP15	Mina Clavero - Giulio Cesare II	22.79 km	Sébastien Loeb	18: 04.5
	WP16	El Condor - Copina II	16.29 km	Jari-Matti Latvala	13: 06.5
	WP17	Icho Cruz - Carlos Paz II	9.73 km	Sébastien Loeb	6: 26.6
	WP18	Estadio Córdoba II	2.4 km	Dani Sordo	2: 23.6
Day 4 (April 26th)	WP19	Villa Giardino - La Falda	15.78 km	Sébastien Loeb	11: 18.2
	WP20	Valle Hermoso - Casa Grande	10.95 km	Sébastien Loeb	7: 14.8
	WP21	Cosquin - Tanti	11.27 km	Jari-Matti Latvala	6: 19.8
	WP22	Tanta Nuevo - Villa Garcia	7.6 km	Jari-Matti Latvala	4: 15.9
	WP23	Estadio Córdoba III	2.4 km	Sébastien Loeb	2: 26.6

Individual evidence

1. ↑ motorsport-total.com: Loeb wins and ensures preliminary World Championship decision , accessed on December 28, 2014

Web links

Commons : World Rally Championship 2009  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• Official website