WRC
Swedish Rally: Post-event press conference
The Uddeholm Swedish Rally 2004 was won by the first non Scandinavian driver in the history. The 29 year old Sebastian Loeb, Citroën Total came in first in front of the three time winner Marcus Grönholm, Marlboro Peugeot Total and 2003 World ...
Edited: Mar 17, 2004, 2:24 AM
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The Uddeholm Swedish Rally 2004 was won by the first non Scandinavian driver in the history. The 29 year old Sebastian Loeb, Citroën Total came in first in front of the three time winner Marcus Grönholm, Marlboro Peugeot Total and 2003 World Champion Petter Solberg, 555 Subaru World Rally Team.
Q: How does it feel to break the Scandinavian dominance?
Loeb: It's very nice to win here it's my first victory in a non tarmac rally.
Q: Before the start of this rally, how good did you think your chances of winning were?
Loeb: I thought it would be difficult because of Marcus. I expected it to be fast and competitive. It was a big fight yesterday with Marcus and Markko, but to win was more than we expected.
Q: Did the win in Monte Carlo give you more confidence?
Elena: It didn't give us more confidence because it was two completely different events.
Q: Marcus you lead the rally; without the power steering problems and two spins, do you think you would have won the rally?
Grönholm: It's stupid to think like that. But of course we have one minute with the power steering and after that I had to drive over the limit sometimes and therefore the spins. But without these problems, of course, but nothing is sure.
Q: After your spin yesterday you did the final super special stage with no lights. How difficult was that?
Rautianen: Luckily it was good light on the circuit only a small part was in the forest but Marcus took it a little bit careful and we could manage to set a fairly good time.
Q: You were quite close to Marcus on the final day. Do you think you might been able to have second place?
Solberg: Maybe it had been different without all the problems yesterday, but still it's nothing to talk about. Over all I'm quite happy with third place. Especially in Sweden where I've never done well before. Looking good for next year!
Q: Two rallies and two wins. Do you think that this means the Xsara is competitive everywhere now?
Fréquelin: I think that we showed last year that we are competitive on every surface. And now Sebastian and Daniel have showed that the Xsara is competitive in this event as well. For Citroën this is a very good result after two rallies.
Q: Would you say that this is one of your most special victories so far?
Loeb: Yes, it is very important for me to prove I could win on other surfaces than tarmac.
Q: Would you like to see more rallies on snow?
Loeb: Why not. We had a good result here. So I like now to drive on snow.
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