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Ogier wins WRC Greece

The Citroën Total World Rally Team crew of Sébastien Ogier and Julien Ingrassia won the 2011 Acropolis Rally of Greece, the seventh round of the FIA World Rally Championship. The French crew finished 10.5 seconds ahead of team-mates Sébastien Loeb and Daniel Elena, with the Ford Abu Dhabi World Rally Team pairing of Mikko Hirvonen and Jarmo Lehtinen third.

In the FIA World Rally Championship for Drivers, Loeb extends his lead and has a 17 point advantage over Hirvonen. Ogier has however closed the gap and is just four points adrift of the Finn in third position. In the Manufacturers’ Championship, Citroën’s maximum points haul sees it pull out a 55 point lead over Ford.
 
The final day of competition took the crews into the hills east of Loutraki for two identical loops of two stages before rounding off the event with the Power Stage, in which additional points are awarded to the fastest three drivers through this single stage. Here, Ogier claimed honours and an additional three points, with Loeb and Hirvonen taking two and one point extra respectively.
 
Loeb started the day with the advantage but was immediately overhauled by Ogier, by a mere one-tenth of a second. Ogier reclaimed the advantage after the third stage and from there inched out his advantage to a winning margin of 10.5 seconds. Hirvonen, who started fourth, passed Solberg in the opening stage, leaving the Norwegian to claim fourth. Jari-Matti Latvala finally managed to climb into ninth position after losing time on Friday with a transmission problem, and then on Saturday more time with a broken turbo.
 
The eighth round of the FIA World Rally Championship takes the crews to Rally Finland (28-30 July).

Final positions
1, S Ogier/J Ingrassia, FRA, Citroen DS3, 4hr 04min 44.3sec
2, S Loeb/D Elena, FRA, Citroen DS3, 4hr 04min 54.8sec
3, M Hirvonen/J Lehtinen, FIN, Ford Fiesta RS, 4hr 04min 57.8sec
4, P Solberg/C Patterson, NOR, Citroen DS3, 4hr 05min 23.1 sec
5, H Solberg/I Minor, NOR, Ford Fiesta RS, 4hr 10min 09.0sec
6, M Wilson/S Martin, GBR, Ford Fiesta RS, 4hr 11min 39.0sec
7, K Räikkönen/K Lindström, FIN, Citroen DS3, 4hr 13min 13.7sec
8, J Hanninen/M Markkula, FIN, Skoda Fabia, 4hr 16min 19.0sec
9, J-M Latvala/M Anttila, FIN, Ford Fiesta RS, 4hr 17min 53.1sec
10, D Kuipers/F Miclotte, NLD, Ford Fiesta RS, 4hr 19min 54.4sec

Drivers                                        
1, S Loeb, 146pts                       
2, M Hirvonen, 129pts                       
3, S Ogier, 124pts                       
4, J-M Latvala, 76pts                  
5, P Solberg, 73pts                  
6, M Østberg, 48pts                  

Manufacturers
1, Citroen Total, 250pts
2, Ford Abu Dhabi, 195pts
3, M-Sport Stobart Ford, 87pts
4, Petter Solberg, 61pts
5, Ice 1 Racing, 34pts
6, Munchi's Ford, 32pts