Snow joke for Loeb in Norway

World champion Sebastien Loeb handed the title-race lead to rival Marcus Gronholm as the Citroen driver crashed twice during the second day of Rally Norway.

Frenchman Loeb was in third place in the overall event standings when he crashed into a snow bank and got stuck on stage 12 near the Winter Olympics city of Lillehammer.

Loeb managed to rejoin the rally but had dropped to nearly nine minutes behind leader Mikko Hirvonen who held the lead by 21 seconds from Ford team-mate Gronholm by the end of stage 12.

Loeb was two minutes behind the eighth-placed driver and the final world championship point of offer at the event.

"Sebastien went straight on at a junction and slid into a snowbank," said a Citroen spokesman.

"There were no spectators close by so he lost a lot of time getting out and back onto the road. The car was not really damaged, just a bit of light bodywork damage."

Loeb had gone into the rally holding a two-point lead over Gronholm in the standings after both had won one event so far this season.

Although he had been expected to lose that lead by the end of the event the crash on stage 12 seriously dented Loeb's hopes of staying in touch with Gronholm in the overall points standings.

But a second crash on stage 13 further hit Loeb's chances with the Frenchman losing nine minutes and falling to 16th overall, 18 minutes behind the leader.

Loeb admitted: "I went straight in a junction and I went in a snowbank. I lost eight minutes, then on this one, we were two minutes off eighth place so I tried hard - nothing to lose - and we lost it again."

Hirvonen retained the lead by the end of the day's action by just over 19 seconds from Gronholm.

By the end of the day Loeb was in 16th, 10 minutes behind eighth-placed Xavier Pons in the final points scoring position.

British driver Matthew Wilson recovered from breaking his Stobart Ford's suspension on the opening day to finish the second leg of Rally Norway in 20th overall.