Loeb wins Cork '20' International Rally

World Rally Champion, Sebastien Loeb took his expected victory in the Murphy Construction Cork "20" International Rally.

The French driver with his co-driver, Daniel Elena brought their Citroen C4 to a facile victory – they were two minutes and 21.5 seconds ahead of the Citroen Xsara of Dani Sordo/Mark Marti (Citroen Xsara).

Mark Higgins/Rory Kennedy (Subaru WRC) were over two and a half minutes behind in third.

The rally decided the outcome of the Irish Tarmac series with fourth place enough for Eugene Donnelly/Paul Kiely (Subaru) to clinch a fourth successive Irish Tarmac crown.

On today’s stages in North Cork, Loeb set the quickest times on the opening loop of three tests and backed off on the repeat loop top take victory and more importantly gain further experience of the Irish roads ahead of Rally Ireland.

Dani Sordo was also well pleased with his first tastes of Irish roads.

Mark Higgins finally sorted his Subaru but could do little to prevent Donnelly from securing another Irish title.

Mikko Hirvonen, who was outside the top fifty yesterday, was fastest on the last stage and finished

fifth ahead of Subaru duo, Eamonn Boland and Tim McNulty.

The top ten was completed by the Ford Focus WRC’s of Aaron MacHale, Michael Barrable and Gareth MacHale.

Colm Murphy (Subaru) won Group N to clinch the showroom title in the Irish Tarmac Championship.

Kevin Kelleher (Mitsubishi) was second in Group N with Alan Ring (Subaru) third.

Phil Collins (Escort) won the National Rally.

Johnny Greer won the Fiesta Challenge as Alistair Fisher took the championship on a tie-break.

The Junior category was won by Damien McCarthy (Honda Civic) and Todd Falvey (Porsche 911) won the Historics.

1. S. Loeb/D. Elena (Citroen C4WRC) 2h. 02m. 09.5s.

2. D. Sordo/M. Marti (Citroen Xsara WRC) 2h. 04m.31.0s.

3. M. Higgins/R. Kennedy (Subaru WRC) 2h. 07m. 09.3s.

4. E. Donnelly/P. Kiely (Subaru WRC) 2h. 07m. 52.7s.

5. M. Hirvonen/J. Lehtinen (Ford Focus WRC) 2h. 09m.38.5s.

6. E. Boland/F. Regan (Subaru WRC) 2h. 10m. 44.2s.

7. T. McNulty/E. O'Donnell (Subaru WRC) 2h. 11m.40.8s.

8. A. MacHale/K. Duffy (Ford Focus WRC) 2h. 13m.35.0s.

9. M. Barrable/D. O'Gorman (Ford Focus WRC) 2h. 15m.08.0s.

10. G. MacHale/C. Parry (Ford Focus WRC) 2h. 16m.13.1s.