Dani Sordo fastest at Jordan Rally shakedown

Dani Sordo of the Total Citroen team topped the time sheet at today’s pre-rally shakedown in Jordan.

The Spaniard completed the 2.3km test stage in a time of 1min 14.3sec, two-tenths of a second quicker than Stobart Ford driver Gigi Galli, who was next fastest.

The road was located 7.5km from the Dead Sea service park, and featured a hard-packed gravel surface which was representative of the majority of the special stages. Temperatures were representative too, and with the sun beating down the temperature reached 41 degrees Celsius at the end of the session.

Sordo and his Citroen team-mate Sebastien Loeb completed just four runs of the stage each, while Gigi Galli had the busiest morning, tackling it 10 times between 0800hrs and 1200hrs.

Luis Perez Companc’s substitute at the Munchi’s Ford team, Barry Clark drove the stage five times and went faster on each occasion. His times improved from 1min 29.2sec on his first attempt to a best of 1min 21.7sec on his final run.

Per-Gunnar Andersson’s best time was two seconds slower than that of his Suzuki team mate Toni Gardemeister. “We had a couple of technical problems,” said Andersson. “It was hydraulics related and gave us some gear selection difficulties and affected the clutch so it was difficult to get off the start line. But it should be okay - we have some time before the start to get it fixed.”

Here are the times for all of the WRC competitors:

1. Sordo. 1:14.3
2. Galli: 1:14.5
3. Hirvonen. 1:14.5
4. Loeb. 1:14.7
5. Latvala: 1:14.8
6. Atkinson. 1:14.8
7. P. Solberg 1:14.9
8. H. Solberg: 1:15.6
9. Aava. 1:15.7
10. Al Qassimi. 1:16.6
11. Gardemeister: 1:16.7
12. Wilson. 1:16.8
14. Andersson: 1:18.4
13. Villagra: 1:17.2
15. Rautenbach. 1:18.7
16. Clark: 1:21.7