Conditions were dry, warm and sunny as crews left the service area from 0800hrs to tackle the rally’s second leg. Chris Atkinson re-joined the event after a collision with some rocks in the road on Friday’s penultimate stage. But with ten minutes of penalty time added and the dubious honour of running as first car on the road, the Aussie’s original objective of a top-five finish was out of reach. Instead, the day would be more about building experience of the stages, and developing the pace of the Impreza WRC2007 on its fourth rally. Rally leaders Sebastien Loeb and Marcus Gronholm were first and second quickest through the tricky 22km Loelle section, followed by Mikko Hirvonen, Dani Sordo and Petter Solberg, who’s Impreza was back to full strength after brake problems on Friday afternoon.
Fastest Time: Loeb (Citroen) 13m 40.6s

After a refuelling halt, competitors headed to the leg’s longest stage, Monte Lerno. Run in exactly the same format as 2006, it featured a mix of conditions and, at the 21km mark, a massive crest known as ‘Micky’s jump’ which launched Chris Atkinson’s car more than two metres into the air last year. Atkinson approached things more cautiously this time, and despite acting as road sweeper for the rest the field he completed the section cleanly, with the twelfth fastest time. Having lost time on leg one with a brake problem, Subaru’s Petter Solberg took a gamble with a softer suspension set up on leg two, in an effort to close the gap on the leaders. But the changes did not have the desired effect on the car’s performance, and although he set a solid sixth-fastest time, it was not enough to catch those ahead.

Fastest Time: Loeb (Citroen) 19m 23.3s

The third stage of the morning loop was Su Filigosu, which had been extended for 2007 with the addition of a new partly asphalt section at the start. According to Chris Atkinson’s co-driver Stephane Prevot, the sequence of jumps, crests and deceptive junctions in the last five kilometres of the stage made it the most difficult section of the day. Another stage win from Loeb made it a clean sweep of the morning loop for the Frenchman, whose rally lead now stood at 41seconds. Loeb’s cause was helped by a slow time from his closest rival Marcus Gronholm who dropped 12.5sec. Petter Solberg set the seventh-fastest time. After the finish control crews returned to Olbia for a 30-minute service halt.

Fastest Time: Loeb (Citroen) 12m 36.3s

“It’s disappointing that we haven’t been able to chase down the drivers ahead of us this morning. We made some changes to the set-up last night and now in service we’ll have to look at the data and try to understand why they didn’t have the effect we expected.”
“It was busy out there this morning: the spectators seemed pretty excited when we came through – maybe because they had been waiting for a long time and we’re the first car on the road. Running first meant that the road was very slippery for us, because there was some loose sandy gravel on top of the hard base surface. The road will be cleaner when we revisit the stages after service, but we won’t be taking any huge risks, because we must also use this car in Greece in two weeks. We’re treating today and tomorrow as an opportunity to try some set-up changes and gather some important data to put us in a strong position for Greece.”

Saturday afternoon’s stages were a repeat of the morning loop. Fresh from service and with a suspension set-up similar to the one he had used on leg one, Petter Solberg picked up the pace again and set the fourth fastest time - his most competitive form of the day. Solberg’s immediate target was the fifth place of Citroen’s Dani Sordo, and by beating him on the stage the Norwegian moved to within 40 seconds of that goal. Without the handicap of sweeping the road on the second pass, Atkinson too enjoyed better fortune on the repeat of Loelle, breaking into to the top-10 stage times for the first time that day.
Fastest Time: Gronholm (Ford) 13m 31.6s

The road surface of the repeated Monte Lerno test had cleaned significantly since the earlier running, and stage winner Sebastien Loeb completed the 29km section 25sec quicker than he had in the morning. Marcus Gronholm continued to keep the pressure on the Frenchman, and was just 0.8sec slower, but with one more stage of the day to go, Loeb’s lead stood at more than 40 seconds. Dani Sordo set the third fastest time, two seconds quicker than Petter Solberg who was fourth. Chris Atkinson’s improved form continued and the Australian was the sixth fastest driver.
Fastest Time: Loeb (Citroen) 18m 58.7s

The final stage of the day brought a last charge from Marcus Gronholm who won the stage and clawed back four seconds of Loeb’s lead. Loeb was second, with Hirvonen third and Sordo fourth, a result which elevated him to fourth on the leaderboard. Henning Solberg dropped to fifth overall and with Petter just 30 seconds behind after another top-five stage time the scene was set for a Norwegian family battle on Sunday. Chris Atkinson ended the day with another solid top-ten performance and the benefit of 71km of testing and development work.
Fastest Time: Gronholm (Ford) 12m 19.3s

	1 Sebastien LOEB CITROEN C4 WRC 3:12:45.6   2 Marcus GRONHORM FORD Focus RS WRC 06 +36.5   3 Mikko HIRVONEN FORD Focus RS WRC 06 +1:30.2   4 Daniel SORDO CITROEN C4 WRC +2:22.4   5 Henning SOLBERG FORD Focus RS WRC 06 +2:32.7   6 Petter SOLBERG SUBARU IMPREZA WRC2007 +3:02.6   7 Toni GARDEMEITER Mitsubishi Lancer WR05* +5:21.5   8 Manfred STOHL CITROEN Xsara WRC +5:44.8   9 Juho HANNINEN Mitsubishi Lancer WR05* +9:43.3   10 Jari-Matti LATVALA FORD Focus RS WRC 06 +12:15.8   12 Chris ATKINSON SUBARU IMPREZA WRC2007 +16:06.4

Another six stages make up the final day of Rally d’Italia-Sardegna. The tests are situated to the north and west of Olbia, the rally base. Unusually, there is no midday service halt: instead there is a short stop for refuelling between SS15 and SS16. After the final special stage, Braniatogghiu, the drivers drive to Porto Cervo for the ceremonial finish at 1430hrs.