The final day of the Wales Rally GB consisted of two loops of two stages
totalling 96.10 kilometres, with service at Swansea in between them. The
finish, watched by thousands of fans, took place in the Welsh capital of
Cardiff. With temperatures that dipped as low as minus six degrees
centigrade overnight, there was plenty of frost and ice on the roads.
Nonetheless, neither driver put a foot wrong in the tricky conditions.
Andersson was able to maintain the fifth place that he started the day with,
while Gardemeister made up one position to finish seventh.

Car news - Suzuki SX4 WRC n.11 (Gardemeister), n.12 (Andersson):

Both the Suzuki SX4 WRCs were completely reliable throughout all three days
of the rally, highlighting the car's reputation for strength and durability
in some of the most inhospitable conditions seen all year. The drivers
progressively adjusted the SX4 WRC's suspension set-up to cope with the soft
roads today, but with such a wide variety of conditions it was mostly a
question of identifying the best compromise. Despite the challenging stages,
the car showed that it was capable of setting some top-five times over the
course of the rally - with Andersson finishing day one on the provisional
podium.

Both drivers concentrated just on reaching the finish during the final leg
today, although Gardemeister had a slight impact with a bank after sliding
on a patch of ice on the day's second stage. P-G enjoyed a solid run to the
finish, having steered clear of trouble throughout the four slippery stages
that concluded the 2008 World Rally Championship season.

Driver news:

Toni Gardemeister: "Generally speaking there has been a surprising amount of
grip today; when I opened the curtains and saw the frost this morning I
thought that it would be much worse. However, we still found a patch of ice
on SS17 and I had to go up the bank, otherwise we would have been off the
road. Apart from that we had no real problems at all and I'm pleased to end
the season with a points finish. It's very clear that we've improved the SX4
WRC a lot throughout the year in terms of both speed and reliability."

P-G Andersson: "It's been a really good rally for me, and the highlight was
obviously finishing the first day in third overall. Today we had a big gap
to the car in front so it was more a question of maintaining our position
and luckily the conditions were a little more consistent than they were
yesterday, so that helped us. We've had no problems at all during all three
days and equalled our best ever result here despite the tricky weather, so
it's an extremely positive way to end the season."

Team news:

Suzuki World Rally Team Director Shusuke Inagaki: "The Wales Rally Great
Britain is renowned for providing an extremely tough challenge, but
conditions this year have been even worse than anticipated. Nonetheless, our
cars have been extremely reliable and our drivers have kept them on the
road. As a result, we have once more brought both the SX4 WRCs home in the
points without problems for the second consecutive time. This is a sign of
the very real progress we have made, and I would like to thank everybody in
the team for all their efforts over the course of the season."