Petter and Phil got off to a dramatic start in Mexico. And all the excitement started on the first stage of the rally, when they hit a dog. The impact with the dog did not cause any damage to the car, but we can only imagine how the dog felt after being hit by a car that was not taking it slowly. Later, at the end of the stage, Petter got into some really problems, when the car suddenly were without brakes. – No handbrake, and the pedal went right to the floor, which was not fun considering the rest of the stage were only downhill! On the roadsection after the stage they managed to locate the problem and drove the next two stages with brakes on only 3 wheels, before the team were able to solve the problem in the servicepark.

But day 1 didn’t just bring difficulties for our boys. Two stagewins, SS4 and SS7, together with splendid driving throughout the day, has placed them in fourth position with only a minute up to the leader, Jari-Matti Latvala. Who needs brakes?!?!

The winner of the Swedish Rally is also leading Rally Mexico after day 1. Jari-Matti Latvala have been driving fast, in spite of being second on the road today and “member of team Sweaping the Road”. Sebastien Loeb is second overall today, while the other Subaru with Chris Atkinson is third.

Rally Mexico has been challenging for most of the drivers today, and forced many of them to retire. Dani Sordo were the first one, when he retired on SS1 with a broken suspension. Suzuki came down with two retirements today. PG Andersson started on SS3 with an engine running only on 3 cylinders. He made it back to the servicepark, but after inspection the team found the engine was too damaged to continue with rallying. Toni Gardemeister were facing problems from the start of the day, also engine-related, and he retired on SS4. Gigi Galli went off the road first time on SS3, and lost about 90 seconds when the rear wheels were stuck in a ditch. Galli also went off the road on SS4, and this time it was forcing him to retire. Mikko Hirvonen lost about 30 seconds on a puncture at SS5.

Rally Mexico continues with 8 more stages Saturday. First car is on the road at 0824 local time (1524 norwegian time).

Overall classification Day 1 Rally Mexico

1. Jari- Matti Latvala, Ford, tid  1.23.38,6
2. Sebastien Loeb, Citroen +9,6
3. Chris Atkinson, Subaru +22,4
4. Petter, Subaru +1.01,9
5. Mikko Hirvonen, Ford +1.10,6
6. Henning Solberg, Ford +2.43,6
7. Matthew Wilson, Ford +2.52,9
8. Frederico Villagra, Ford +5.30,0