February 5^th, 2006

Intermediate Report: Leg 3, Swedish Rally 2006, February 2^nd to 5^th

A bad start for Red Bull Skoda to

the third leg of the Swedish Rally

Mattias Ekstrom/Stefan Bergman (SWE)
out of P5 on SS 14 after an accident.

Andreas Aigner (AUT)/Timo Gottschalk (GER) also

had to park their Skoda Fabia early prior to SS 16

in 22^nd after a constant misfire.

Despite the two retirements, the team management can

draw informative conclusions from two positive days

After two successful days of the Swedish Rally near Hagfors the final day of the event did not go according to plan for Red Bull Skoda.

In severely cold weather (minus 22 degrees centigrade) and fresh snow on some stages, the Skoda Fabia WRC of Mattias Ekstrom stopped on its way to the first special stage of the day. The crew checked all systems, replaced some cabling and was able to continue within the allocated time. In the beginning of special stage 14, everything went according to plan: "After four kilometres the car just got away from me and we touched a snow bank, crushing the front of the Fabia including the radiator, so we were unable to continue like that. Too bad, we were on course to secure points in the drivers' and the manufacturers' championships", a rather disappointed Mattias Ekstrom explained.

The day did not turn out much better for Andreas Aigner, the 21 year old from Styria. Ever since yesterday evening he had struggled with a misfire due to a broken spark plug. The team had hoped that the severed pieces would burn up but it did not happen. On the contrary, it damaged part of the cylinder, so the team management decided to pull Aigner out of the event prior to the start of SS 16. "Of course I am bitterly disappointed. Just four stages to go, and despite the misfire the car worked rather well, I felt very comfortable. Nevertheless one has to look on the bright side of things, I gained a lot of experience in Sweden and now I hope for another good result at my next WRC event in Spain."

Armin Schwarz and Raimund Baumschlager were able to give a redeeming summary on behalf of the whole team despite today's disappointment: "By driving up to fifth place overall, Mattias has shown for two successful days what the Skoda Fabia WRC is capable of. The car still has a lot of potential and will continue to delight us in the future.

We are awfully sorry for Andreas Aigner. He has done a good rally in very difficult conditions, you just need to look at his times. To have to stop four stages before the end is heartbreaking, especially for a young driver. But his time is yet to come. Our team was also delighted by the way the Swedish fans welcomed us, they supported us not only because of Mattias Ekstrom, but because they liked the way our whole team performed."

On top of the leaderboard, the epic battle between Marcus Gronholm (Ford) and Sebastien Loeb (Citroen) continues. After three stage wins, the reigning world champion was able to cut down his deficit from more than 25 seconds to just 14.4 seconds. The only Austrian still running is Manfred Stohl who, after retiring yesterday, has restarted under SupeRally rules. He is down in 19^th position.

Overall classification after 16 of 19 special stages:

P1 Marcus Gronholm (Ford) 2:45:35.9 hours, P2 Sebastien Loeb (Citroen) + 14,4 sec, P3 Daniel Carlsson (Mitsubishi) + 2:38.2 min, P4 Gigi Galli (Mitsubishi) + 2:38.9 min, P5 Janne Tuohino (Citroen) + 4:06.6 min, P6 Thomas Radstrom (Subaru) + 4:52.7 min, P7 Kosti Katajamaki (Ford) + 6:30.5 min, P8 Xavier Pons (Citroen) + 7:24.9, P9 Jimmy Joge (Peugeot) + 7:57.7, P10 Henning Solberg (Peugeot) + 8:31.7 min, P11 Jan Kopecky (Skoda Fabia) + 10:44.7 min, P19 Manfred Stohl (Peugeot) + 18:58.6 minutes

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