Intro:

Sebastian Loeb won his third Rally of New Zealand on Sunday to extend his lead in the World Rally Championships overall standings.

Script:

The Rally of New Zealand reached its conclusion on Sunday, with Citroen's Sebastian Loeb winning the race for a third time to extend his overall advantage in the World Rally Championship standings.

The reigning world champion held a 6.4 second advantage over team mate Mikko Hirvonen heading into the final seven stages and never looked like relinquishing it.

Rather than allow Hirvonen to chase down his team mate Citroen asked their drivers to take it easy in a bid to avoid any accidents, the result of which was Loeb extending his lead to just under 30 seconds by the end of the race.

SOUNDBITE (English): Sebastien Loeb
"Yeah, for sure. It was a great victory. It was a long weekend with some very difficult conditions. Big, big fight with Mikko (Hirvonen) all the weekend. So it was not easy. We are here now at the end of the rally, that was very important to. A few mistakes in the power stage, pushing a bit too hard and went wide two or three times. So we got one point but the most important (thing) is to be here."

The last position on the podium went to Ford's Petter Soldberg, who drove brilliantly over the weekend to finish one minute and 36.4 seconds behind Loeb in third after a poor tyre choice on the first day ended any hopes he had of victory.

M-Sport Ford World Rally driver Ott Tanak saw his hopes of a top five finish on his New Zealand debut dashed when he rolled his car on stage 20 having been running in fifth.

The result of Rally New Zealand means Loeb leads the world championship by 38 points, with Hirvonen in second after seven of this year's 13 races.