The world champion for 2012 Sebastien Loeb make a great victory to close the season. This rally is the last Sebastien Loeb in a full program. In the last day Dani Sordo the local star win 4 of 6 stages as moved to 9 position overall ahead Evgeny Novikov at 10th position. Chris Atkinson finished the rally after serial of failures at 7th position, 8th place for P. Andersson.

Comments:
Sordo: “It’s really a nice end of the rally. We make a mistake on the first day then we had a small problem with the car. But we have been fighting for the best times, which is very good and I am happy to finish the year like this.”
Citroen decide between Dani Sordo and Mads Ostberg for season 2013 as Sordo was a Citroen pilot couple of years with Loeb:
Sord:  “I don’t know for next year. I am in discussions with Citroen but I don’t know. I know Mads is pushing really hard. We can both do a good job for the team so good luck to both.”
Ostberg: “We are talking to Citroen and Ford and MINI. I think we have a strong possibility of being in a good team and having a good season next year.”

Citroen team chief Yves Matton: “It will be between Mads Ostberg and Dani Sordo. We wanted to wait until the result of the last rally. The decision will not be taken on the result of one rally. They have both impressed me.”

Final Results:
1. S. Loeb 4:14:29.1
2. J. Latvala +7.0
3. M. Hirvonen +1:46.8
4. M. Ostberg +1:56.4
5. J. Nikira +16:07.9
6. C. Breen +18:10.4

Jari-Matti Latvala win the Power Stage.

Overall classification season 2012:
1. S. Loeb 270
2. M. Hirvonen 213
3. J. Latvala 154
4. M. Ostberg 149
5. P. Solberg 124
6. E. Novikov 88
7. T. Neuville 53
8. O. Tanak 52
9. M. Prokop 46
10. S. Ogier 41

Manufacture standing season 2012:
1. Citroen Total World Rally Team 413
2. Ford World Rally Team 281
3. M-Sport Ford World Rally Team 170
4. Citroen Junior World Rally Team 72
5. Adapta World Rally Team 71
6. Qatar World Rally Team 71
 

The world champion Sebastien Loeb show his class of master. After a perfect drive and very good tactic Loeb is the rally leader in Spain. A wrong choice of tyres and went off the road for 40 seconds finished the ambitions of Mads Ostberg for Spain triumph.
Ostberg said:
“We had some information that the stage was 50 per cent dry, we put some hard tyres on, but for sure it was not. We went off quite early and lost 40s or something. We continued but hit a barrier later on. It was very difficult and I’m very disappointed.”
Loeb comments: “Jari was pushing very hard in the first one so we had to react in this one. I’ve pushed on the limit from the start to the end and I’m happy with my driving. For sure it’s a really tough fight.”
Ostberg in the next stage comments: “The [soft] set-up is absolutely horrible and it’s not possible to drive the car. I just lose the grip everywhere when it’s drying up. I’m more sideways than straight. This is not good for the result - I guarantee we will lose a lot of time. It’s hopeless.
It’s been absolutely horrible for me. I have not got a clue what is happening. There must be something wrong because the car is impossible to drive.”

Results after SS 12 (End of Day 2)
1. S. Loeb 3:16:14.1
2. J. Latvala +27.0
3. M. Hirvonen +1:14.1
4. O. Tanak +1:28.8
5. M. Ostberg +1:31.4
6. H. Weijs +9:02.9
 
For tomorrow there are 6 stages to run.
 

Jari-Matti Latvala win the first stage of Rally Spain 2012 followed by Sebastien Loeb at +0.5 seconds.

In the second stage follow a dramatic changes in the rally. The top drivers Petter Solberg and Thierry Neuville damaged their cars and retired by the rally. The season 2012 finished for Solberg with a disaster. He not succeeds with the manufacture team of Ford after big desire to win a rally.

It is interesting that Solberg and Neuville out of the road as both crashed in a same rock.

The heavy rain on the stage with cold temperatures makes the road very difficult as the road position for the top drivers do not provide advantages.

The stage winner is Mads Ostberg and Ott Tanak with identical time. Third is Mikko Hirvonen far back at 17.5 seconds slower than the leaders. The champion Loeb is forth at 25.5 seconds. Latvala spin in the stage and lost 33.6 seconds by the leaders.

Comments after SS 2:

Loeb: "I think we had the right tyre choice for the morning, but the road position is really bad. We had heavy rain, big ruts and a lot of water. I cannot drive on the line at all."

Hirvonen: "There's so much standing water that sometimes even in a straight line you have a massive slide."

In stage 3 Mads Otsberg became a rally leader as Ott Tanak who was the leader after SS 2 moved to second at +2.7 seconds.

The ambitions of the local star Dani Sordo over in stage 3 as he out of the road and finished the day retired. In the stage Latvala driver very carefully as lost another 28 seconds by the leader.

Evgeny Novikov takes stage 4 as he moved to sixth position overall. But in stage 5 Novikov is in the ditch and probably retire by the rally. Chris Atkinson is also out of the road.

In stage 5 the second position for Ott Tanak is lost as he loses 57 seconds and moved to fifth position overall due too caution the same do Hirvonen who lost 45 second in stage 5. That changes allow to the champion Loeb to move to second position at 25 seconds after the leader.

Loeb comments after SS 5: "I tried really hard. In this one it was a bit better. I think in the previous stage it was getting muddy after the passes of the cars. Finally in this one I had a good drive."

Results after SS 5:
1. M. Ostberg 1:38:53.7
2. S. Loeb +25.1
3. J. Latvala +49.3
4. M. Hirvonen +1:05.6
5. O. Tanak +1:13.5
6. S. Ogier +4:58.6