As promised, here it is — all the news and notes from Rally Mexico.

First, a quick look at the podium:

1. Markko Martin
2. Francois Duval
3. Carlos Sainz

An impressive sweep for Ford, but it didn’t happen without quite a bit of luck. Petter Solberg started the rally quite fast, and he and Seb Loeb swapped scratch times on Day 1. Solberg set a torrid pace on Saturday, however, and extended his lead by sweeping the day’s stages. Unfortunately, the celebration was short-lived. Solberg was a assessed a one minute penalty for coming into a time stop late thanks to a dead battery in his Impreza. To make matters worse, the marshalls were looking into whether or not Solberg received outside help getting his car into service, which could lead to an additional penalty of five minutes. More on that later….

At the same time, Seb Loeb hit a rock in his Xsara, lost oil pressure, and promptly retired. So much for three consecutive wins.

Thanks to Solberg’s initial penalty and Loeb’s retirement, Markko Martin was handed the lead. Martin had slipped a bit on day two, and without the leaders’ misfortunes, Martin would have only been fighting for third, but now he was leading.

Before the end of the day, Solberg was assess an additional five minute penalty for receiving outside assistance. Suddenly the Norwegian dropped out of the top ten. This didn’t affect his confidence, though, and Solberg stormed through the final stages of the day, taking back over three minutes of time and landing in fifth going into day 3 (Solberg adroitly pointed out overnight that had he not been assessed the penalties his pace would have given him a two minute cushion over the rest of the field.

Heading into day 3 it looked like Carlos Sainz could challenge Martin, but a spin and roll put the Spainard in third place to stay. Ford’ Francois Duval looked quick holding down third, and Sainz’s roll kept him from challenging the youngster.

Mexico was a huge disappointment for Peugeot. Harri Rovanpera’s experience on the rally was all for nothing as he finished tenth, never looking comfortable behind the wheel of the 307. Marcus Gronholm barely salvaged his rally by winning the final two stages, but his 307 was slowed by mechanical difficulties on day two. It will interesting to see what the fickle Peugeot team does with Rovanpera — before the rally he was their man. Now I wouldn’t be surprised to see Freddy Loix made a few appearances in the 307.

Two drivers had very positive rallies. Mikko Hirvonen finished fifth, his first points score for Subaru. He held fourth until the final stages when Solberg passed him. This is a good sign for the young Finn, and the team should expect more good things on other gravel rallies this year. Gilles Panizzi also had a good rally in the new Lancer, finishing in the points in eighth. The car still had some growing pains, but Panizzi was pleased with the progress since Sweden.

Last bit of interesting news — Martin won the rally yet he only set a single scratch time. Solberg won the majority of the stages (9 overall) yet only finished fourth thanks to the time penalties.

Next up, New Zealand on April 14.

Posted on 14 March 2004