Ogier holds slender Rally Mexico lead

After Thursday evening's three short stages Sebastien Ogier holds a slender Rally Mexico lead from Hyundai's Thierry Neuville, who'd been quickest on the opening Guanajuato street stage, with Ogier only third.

The reigning World Rally champion; unbeaten in the 2016 WRC season so far, then went on to set the pace on both runs through the Leon superspecial stage which followed, giving him a 1.7-second overall lead, which he acknowledged will mean little when the rally gets under way proper on Friday, with some extremely long stages and, he runs first on the road!

Volkswagen team-mates Jari-Matti Latvala and shakedown pacesetter Andreas Mikkelsen hold third and fourth with the M-Sport pair of Mads Ostberg and Eric Camilli only a distant 11th and 12th, with the top six currently shared between VW and Hyundai.

The PH Sport-run Citroen team does not have the Rally Mexico on its limited 2016 schedule so Dani Sordo, whose i20 required some repairs and Hayden Paddon are fifth and sixth with Ford privateer Lorenzo Bertelli, an impressive second fastest to Neuville on the street stage, slipping back to seventh after the superspecials.

Leading positions after SS3:-

Pos .... Driver .... Team.... Car .... Gap
1. Sebastien Ogier Volkswagen Motorsport Volkswagen Polo 4m16.5s
2. Thierry NeuvilleHyundai Motorsport Hyundai i20 1.7s
3. Jari-Matti Latvala Volkswagen Motorsport Volkswagen Polo 3.3s
4. Andreas Mikkelsen Volkswagen Motorsport Volkswagen Polo 3.8s
5. Dani Sordo Hyundai Motorsport Hyundai i20 4.1s
6. Hayden Paddon Hyundai Motorsport Hyundai i20 4.6s
7. Lorenzo Bertelli FWRT SRL Ford Fiesta 5.7s
8. Martin ProkopJipocar Czech National Team Ford Fiesta 5.8s
9. Ott Tanak DMACK World Rally Team Ford Fiesta 5.9s
10. Benito Guerra Ford Fiesta 6.0s

4th March, 2016