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MARCUS
GRONHOLM and Timo Rautiainen have won the 2003 Rally of
New Zealand!
After
losing 35 seconds on leg two when the Finnish ace rolled his
Peugeot, the World Champions held it together for the remainder
of the event to take their 14th World Championship victory.
Richard
Burns and Robert Reid stamped their authority during the final
leg with five fastest times in six stages but the Peugeot
pair couldn't put any pressure on team-mate Gronholm and finished
more than one minute adrift of the winner.
Subaru's
Petter Solberg and Phil Mills finished in a fine third position
ahead of Citroen's Sebastien Loeb while Toni Gardemeister
took fifth for Skoda. Alister McRae and David Senior complete
the top six.
|
1
|
Marcus
Gronholm / Timo Rautiainen |
Peugeot
206 WRC |
3hrs
45mins 21.2secs |
|
2
|
Richard
Burns / Robert Reid |
Peugeot
206 WRC |
3hrs
46mins 29.9secs |
|
3
|
Petter
Solberg / Phil Mills |
Subaru
Impreza WRC |
3hrs
47mins 31.0secs |
|
4
|
Sebastien
Loeb / Daniel Elena |
Citroen
Xsara WRC |
3hrs
49mins 36.6secs |
|
5
|
Toni
Gardemeister / Paavo Lukander |
Skoda
Octavia WRC |
3hrs
53mins 35.0secs |
|
6
|
Alister
McRae / David Senior |
Mitsubishi
Lancer |
3hrs
54mins 35.4secs |
|
7
|
Tommi
Makinen / Kaj Lindstrom |
Subaru
Impreza WRC |
3hrs
55mins 11.4secs |
|
8
|
Didier
Auriol / Denis Giraudet |
Skoda
Octavia WRC |
3hrs
55mins 29.8secs |
|
9
|
Francois
Duval / Jean-Marc Fortin |
Ford
Focus WRC |
3hrs
56mins 32.9secs |
|
10
|
Mikko
Hirvonen / Jarmo Lehtinen |
Ford
Focus WRC |
3hrs
59mins 03.5secs |
- Freddy
Loix went off the road on stage 18 and retired.
|
- Carlos
Sainz lost ten minutes after going off the road on
stage ten.
- Tommi
Makinen incurred road penalties when a suspension
change took too long to complete. To make matters
worse, he was then stopped for speeding at a radar
trap.
- Francois
Duval spun on stage eight.
- Markko
Martin lost time with hydraulic problems on stage
ten.
- Marcus
Gronholm rolled on stage 13 but was lucky to lose
just 35 seconds.
- Harri
Rovanpera retired after going off the road on stage
14.
- Markko
Martin retired on stage thirteen when his Focus refused
to restart after he spun and stalled on the stage.
|
- Colin
McRae lost time with a spin on stage one.
- Armin
Schwarz rolled out of the event on stage one.
- Colin
McRae retired at the end of stage six with damage
to his Citroen.
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