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| Championship Standings |
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2005 Championship
After 16 of 16 Rounds |
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| Drivers Points |
| 1 |
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Sébastien Loeb |
127 |
| 2 |
 |
Petter Solberg |
71 |
| 3 |
 |
Marcus Gronholm |
71 |
| 4 |
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Toni Gardemeister |
58 |
| 5 |
 |
Markko Martin |
53 |
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Full Details... |
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| Manufacturers Points |
| 1 |
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Citroen |
188 |
| 2 |
 |
Peugeot |
135 |
| 3 |
 |
Ford |
104 |
| 4 |
 |
Subaru |
97 |
| 5 |
 |
Mitsubishi |
76 |
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Full Details... |
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| Production Points |
| 1 |
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Toshihiro Arai |
50 |
| 2 |
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Nasser Saleh Al-Attiyah |
35 |
| 3 |
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Marcos Ligato |
33 |
| 4 |
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Fumio Nutahara |
22 |
| 5 |
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Xavier Pons |
20 |
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Full Details... |
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| Junior WRC Points |
| 1 |
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Daniel Sordo |
53 |
| 2 |
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Guy Wilks |
35 |
| 3 |
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Urmo Aava |
32 |
| 4 |
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Kris Meeke |
32 |
| 5 |
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Kosti Katajamaki |
31 |
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Full Details... |
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2005|NEWS
RALLYE AUTOMOBILE MONTE-CARLO |
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FORD NEWS AFTER STAGE 12
Manufacturer: Ford
Press Release Type: Mid Leg ThreeThirty of the original 34 starters left Monaco early this morning for the third and final leg of this opening round of the FIA World Rally Championship, seven of whom restarted under new regulations after retiring earlier in the event. Ahead lay six more speed tests, split into two identical loops of three, in the mountains of the Alpes-Maritimes region. Cloudy skies greeted drivers on the first loop, covering 58.04km, with temperatures hovering around freezing. BP-Ford drivers Toni Gardemeister and Jakke Honkanen and team-mates Roman Kresta and Jan Tomanek both opted for soft compound dry weather Michelin rubber on their Focus RS World Rally Cars.
Gardemeister restarted third, embroiled in a three-way battle for second with Marcus Grönholm and Petter Solberg. The BP-Ford driver sped to second fastest behind Solberg on the 7.33km test from Col de Braus to Col de L'Orme and was fourth in the 19.52km La Cabanette - Lantosque. The final stage of the loop, the 31.19km La Bollene Vesubie – Sospel, featured the crossing of the Col de Turini, where huge crowds gathered to watch competitors cross the top of the mountain. As befits one of the most famous locations in the championship, it was a stage of drama.
First Solberg went off the road, damaging his car's front left wheel, and retired. Then Grönholm also crashed, ripping off a wheel and limping through the stage to drop five minutes and plummet to fifth. Gardemeister, therefore, emerged in second overall and returned to service in Monaco 25.9sec clear of new third-placed driver Gilles Panizzi.
"I still have good confidence in the Focus and I'm delighted to be up to second," said Gardemeister. "We had a good fight with Petter until I saw him off the road and we lost some time at his accident. They had pushed the car back on the road and I had to stop briefly and stalled the engine. Our rear anti-toll bar was broken which made the car understeer so I disconnected the front bar before the Turini stage to improve the balance."
Kresta, the Czech's car restored to full health after last night's problems, was in superb form this morning. Fifth and sixth fastest on the opening two stages, the 28-year-old then powered his Focus RS to fastest time over the Turini test, 2.4sec quicker than rally leader Loeb. "Today is a new day and a new race," he said. "Yesterday was a small mistake for me but a big mistake for the result. I've driven better this morning. I'm not pushing, I'm just driving smoothly and that's the best way to drive the Focus. The roads have been 70 per cent dry and 30 per cent wet so a soft compound tyre was a good choice. There is new asphalt on the Turini stage which doesn't offer such good grip and spectators had thrown snow onto the road which made it tricky." Click here for a printable version of this news Item
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