The BP Ultimate Acropolis Rally is still considered as the one of the most fascinating rallies of the World Rally Championship. It’s the first year to see so many drivers fighting for the victory. It is characteristic the fact that Marcus Gronholm, Leg 1 leader, has hardly 10 seconds time gap from the sixth driver, Daniel Sordo. The day included seven special stages of 104.92 kilometres in total. The nature of the stages and the loose gravel were a disadvantage to the cars that were cleaning the road. So we had many surprises such as the two Subaru Impreza WRC07 of Chris Atkinson and Petter Solberg. The Australian won in two s. s. and passed in the first place of the classification by leading the rally until the sixth s. s. of the leg. At the same time, the two key players of the Championship, Marcus Gronholm and Sebastien Loeb, were in suffer while cleaning the road for the others. The French had a very bad start and lost almost 12 seconds in the first s. s. of the day due to bad tire selection and one spun.
In the second loop of the stages, however, the situation got reversed. Marcus Gronholm and Sebastien Loeb, with cleaner routes in front of them, began their own attack. Thus, at the end of the leg, the Finn was at the first position while Petter Solberg has managed to keep the second position with a difference of 8.3 seconds. Chris Atkinson completed the leg in the third place, just 0.7 seconds behind the Norwegian, while Sebastien Loeb is ready to pass him on by lacking only 0.7 seconds! However, the French cannot feel safe with Mikko Hirvonen just 0.6 seconds behind him! The Spanish driver Sordo is 0.4 sec behind the young Finn so the fight goes on. The top eight positions in the classification are concluded with Henning Solberg and Jari Matti Latvala.
In the PWRC, the leadership changed hands many times during the day. Toshihiro Arai and Juho Hanninen fought pretty rough with the Japanese driver reaching Markopoulo at a time gap of only 4,8 sec ahead. Andreas Aigner also took part in the fight but a puncture in the last stage caused him great delay. At the third position is Gabriel Pozzo with1,5 minutes time gap.
As for the Greeks, Aris Vovos faced many problems with the Subaru Impreza WRC and fell in the 15th position of the overall classification. Panos Hatzitsopanis is at the 24th overall and 9th position in group N and Lambros Athanassoulas is at the 26th position overall and 11th in group N.
Tomorrow, Leg2 starts from the Olympic Premises at Markopoulo at 07:30 p. m. Substantially, it is by far the longest, hardest and more exciting leg of the rally. The cars will start crossing the longest s. s. of the rally (Agii Theodori) at 09:03. The second leg will be concluded after 8 special stages of 146,08 kilometers in total.
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