BRISBANE—Five-time world champion Sebastien Loeb won an incident-packed Rally of Australia on Sunday to close the gap on series leader Mikko Hirvonen to a single point with only two rounds remaining this season.
Loeb claimed his 53rd career victory and sixth this year by just 12.5 seconds after a thrilling three-way battle in the first Australian rally held on the gravel roads of northern New South Wales.
"This one is a good one," the Frenchman told reporters. "It was really important for the championship to win here."
Hirvonen, who had won the previous three rounds to climb top of the standings, finished second while Loeb's Citroen team mate Dani Sordo was a close third after the Spaniard had led by one-tenth of a second overnight.
"It was a really tough weekend," Hirvonen said. "We need to forget this one now and move on."
Sebastien Ogier, who led after the first two special stages but bowed out of contention with an unplanned off-road excursion on Saturday, finished fourth while Friday's overnight leader Jari-Matti Latvala came fifth after suffering two punctures.
Titanic struggle
Matthew Wilson and Henning Solberg finished sixth and seventh respectively but the honours went to Loeb, who won four of the concluding 10 stages, to set the scene for a titantic struggle in the last two rallies in Spain and Britain.
"It was a hard fight and because it's been a long time since our last win it feels especially good," he said.
"The championship is really interesting. It will be an incredible fight to the final I think."
Hirvonen credited Loeb's win to a clever tactical ploy by the Citroen team late on Saturday afternoon.
Loeb was leading the rally at that point but slowed down to let Hirvonen's Ford get ahead of him on the time sheets so the Finn would have to start first on Sunday, driving in the worst of the conditions and clearing the road for everyone behind him.
"I couldn't help it, Citroen did really well yesterday and we didn't have a chance today," Hirvonen said.
"Maybe it would have been a different story if I hadn't been first on the road, but there are so many ifs."
Sordo slipped straight back to third place after Sunday's opening stage and although he briefly moved back ahead of Hirvonen into second spot, he was unable to catch him again, finishing 4.6 seconds adrift.
"I pushed really, really hard to try and keep Mikko behind but it was impossible," Sordo said.
"I lost second place but it's okay, I'm still happy with what we've got."
Friday's first full day of the rally was marred by rock-throwing protesters, who claimed the race was damaging the environment and forced the cancellation of two stages.
