According to wrc.com, Henning was absolutely delighted with his performance, especially when taking into account his poor result in the previous rally when he crashed on the way to the first stage of the event.
"It’s coming better and better - this will be my rally - for sure!” he said. “I tried very hard to concentrate in there and it felt really good - now I want to go fast on the rest of the rally," he said.
However, the man of the hour was Mikko Hirvonen who entered the track with a Portuguese flag on his Ford Focus RS WRC. More than 20,000 spectators encouraged him, according to the aforementioned source, as he competed with Sebastien Loeb - who arrive fourth at 1.1 seconds behind.
"What a great start!" said Hirvonen. "The atmosphere in there was incredible. The fans are amazing and I think they appreciated us carrying the flag on the car. Having beaten Sebastien here, I don't think I need to tell anyone what my ambition is for the rest of the weekend."
Compared to the previous rallies when Sebastien Loeb got a big advantage thanks to a successful car configuration, the French driver reckoned the worn tires helped a lot Ford's drivers.
“It’s not so much time to lose, but I think it dropped some on the first lap,” said Loeb. “I think we had too much tread on our tyres. But it’s okay, it’s just a just a short stage. We’ll see how we get on tomorrow.”
Google News