The greatest rally driver in history Sebastien Loeb has ended his fulltime World Rally Championship career with his 76th victory and eighth-straight win on the final round of this year’s series in Spain.
After winning nine-straight WRC titles, Loeb is cutting back to a part-time program in 2013.
Despite trailing Mads Ostberg on a wet opening day on gravel, the switch to tarmac and better weather opened the door for the French star to take the lead and he held that through to the finish.
On the final event for an official Ford entry, Jari-Matti Latvala brought his Fiesta home in second while Mikko Hirvonen finished third in a Citroen.
“I really wanted to win this rally,” Loeb said.
“We were really struggling at the start because it was really tricky on the first day. On the tarmac I was able to take the lead, but today was not easy because we had some strange tire choice and Jari-Matti was pushing very hard and getting closer.”
Ostberg went from the lead back to fifth after spins and handling issues on the second day. The Norwegian was back on the pace on Sunday coming to within 9.6 seconds of Mikko Hirvonen’s third position.
Australia’s Chris Atkinson recovered from a non-finish on the opening day to come from 11th in the second leg up to seventh by the end of the rally. In what was his last event with Mini, the Australian proved his value to the Motorsport Italia-run operation that enjoyed its best results after Atkinson joined the team over the final third of the season.
New Zealand’s Hayden Paddon has finished the Super 2000 category in fifth place after he won every stage on Saturday and five of the day’s six stages on the final leg. If not for a retirement on the opening day he would have almost certainly won the category and finished well inside the top-10.
“We were able to set some more good stage times today, particularly on the longer stage where we took a lot of time out of the rest of the S2000 field,” said Paddon.
“We were hoping to do the same on the repeated run in the afternoon, but unfortunately a puncture stopped us from doing so.”
“In terms of our plans for next year, it is still a work-in-progress. I hope that our speed this weekend has helped, but there is still a lot of work that needs to be done.”
FINAL RESULTS : Ralle de Espana
| Position | Driver | Team | Time |
| 1 | Sebastien Loeb | Citroen | 4:14:29.1 |
| 2 | Jari-Matti Latvala | Ford | +0:07.0 |
| 3 | Mikko Hirvonen | Citroen | +1:46.8 |
| 4 | Mads Ostberg | Adapta Ford | +1:56.4 |
| 5 | Jarkko Nikara | Prodrive Mini | +16:07.9 |
| 6 | Craig Breen | Kel-Tech Ford | +18:10.4 |
| 7 | Chris Atkinson | Italia Mini | +19:14.7 |
| 8 | PG Andersson | Proton | +20:16.1 |
| 9 | Dani Sordo | Prodrive Mini | +25:40.6 |
| 10 | Evgeny Novikov | Autotek Ford | +25:46.6 |
STANDINGS : Drivers
| Position | Driver | Points |
| 1 | Sebastien Loeb | 270 |
| 2 | Mikko Hirvonen | 213 |
| 3 | Jari-Matti Latvala | 154 |
| 4 | Mads Ostberg | 149 |
| 5 | Petter Solberg | 124 |
| 6 | Evgeny Novikov | 88 |
STANDINGS : Teams
| Position | Driver | Points |
| 1 | Citroen WRT | 453 |
| 2 | Ford WRT | 309 |
| 3 | M-Sport Ford WRT | 170 |
| 4 | Adapta WRT | 83 |
| 5 | Citroen Junion WRT | 72 |
| 6 | Qatar WRT | 71 |
