The competitive stages were a mix of asphalt and gravel roads but as a compromise was needed, all cars were set-up in “gravel specification” using Pirelli's Scorpion gravel tyre.

Friday's first day of six stages was run over twisty asphalt roads on the western edge of the Troodos Mountains, north of Paphos and was the longest day of the rally. Saturday and Sunday saw the return to the traditional narrow and rocky roads in the Troodos range.

Sébastien Loeb and Daniel Elena, defending WRC Champions and leaders of the current series, dominated the first day and were fastest on five of the six asphalt stages – beaten only by their team mates, Spaniards Dani Sordo and Marc Marti in their Citroen C4 WRC, who were eventually classified fourth.

The French paring held a 41.8 second lead over Sordo and Marti when the cars returned to Lemesos that evening, with Mikko Hirvonen and Jarmo Lehtinen in their BP Abu Dhabi World Rally Team Ford Focus WRC in third place.

From then on Loeb coolly defended his position – despite almost total loss of brakes in stages 10 and 11 - to secure his 50th WRC victory by 27.2 seconds ahead of the Finnish pairing of Hirvonen and Lehtinen. The five-time World Champion is now 10 points ahead of Hirvonen in the Drivers Championship.
“It's incredible!” said Loeb. “I remember when I beat the records of Carlos [Sainz] and then Colin [McRae] it wasn't so long ago, and now we're on 50. It's a big number, and a nice number! It's like a dream. I'm very happy with what I've achieved but I'm not finished yet. Next I'm going for 51.”

Daniel Elena said: “It feels really nice. Now the most important thing is to try and get all 12 wins this year!”
Hirvonen congratulated Loeb at finish control, and wrote '50' in the dirt on the back of the Frenchman's Citroen. “We lost this event on Friday,” said the Finn. “We managed to take some time back today. If it was drier the result might have been different, but that's how it is. We were faster today though, hopefully we can take that speed to Portugal.”

Norway's Petter Solberg and Welshman Phil Mills set fastest time on stages 10 and 11 and second fastest on stages 12 and 13 in their independently entered Citroen Xsara to take the remaining podium place and record their best result of 2009.

Petter said:” Everybody in the team - all the mechanics - have done an incredible job. We've only got 11 people in our team and they've all worked unbelievably hard to get us here. The build up to this rally was just as stressful as it was in Norway. I know this is an old car, and maybe Citroen would like to finish ahead, but they should be proud about how good the Xsara still is.”

While Friday was a Red Nose day for the Ford Team, Sunday was a Red Letter day for Matthew Wilson and Scott Martin driving for the Stobart VK M-Sport Ford Rally Team. The 22 year old set fastest time on the final stage to take back fifth place from Sébastien Ogier. This was, so far this year, Matt's best-ever WRC result.

This result was some compensation for the Cumbria-based team who laboured to keep their second car, crewed by Norway's Henning Solberg and Cato Menkerud, in the rally and recover to claim 18th place after crashing on Friday's first stage.

Jari-Matti Latvala and Miikka Anttila set fastest time on stage seven but then lost almost 22 minutes after sliding off the road on the next stage, dropping from fourth to 25th. They recovered to finish 12th, a points-scoring position for BP Abu Dhabi World Rally Team Ford.

In the league tables of fastest stage times Loeb won 6. Hirvonen 3, Petter Solberg 2, Jari-Matti Latvala, Dani Sordo and Matthew Wilson with one each.

Sébastien Ogier, 2008 Junior World Champion was in fifth place but crashed on a hairpin bend 200metres before the finish of the final stage. Their Citroen Junior Team mates Conrad Rautenbach and Lancashire's Daniel Barritt were sixth, four minutes 30.9 seconds behind the jubilant Matt Wilson.

Sweden's Patrick Sandell (Skoda Fabia Super 2000) overhauled Portugal's Armindo Araujo (Mitsubishi Lancer Evo 9) on the final stage to win the Production-WRC category and claim ninth place overall.

The Junior-WRC category was won by Martin Prokop driving a Citroen C2 Super 1600 for the Czech National Team. He lead from start to finish and was classified 14th.

There were 25 classified finishers.

For news and results from FxPro Cyprus Rally, the third event in the 12-round 2009 FIA World Rally Championship, visit: http://www.cyprusrally.com.cy/

For all the latest news, video clips, audio, etc, from the FIA World Rally Championship go to; http://www.wrc.com/

WRC Manufacturer Team websites;

BP Ford Abu Dhabi World Rally Team; http://www.bpfordwrc.com/

Citroën Total World Rally Team; http://www.citroen-wrc.com/

Stobart VK M-Sport Ford Rally Team; http://www.stobartmotorsport.com/

Munchi's Ford World Rally Team:

Other WRC websites;

Pirelli - WRC; http://www.pirellityre.com/web/motorsport/rally/wrc/default.page

The next and third round of the FIA WRC is Vodafone Rally of Portugal, 2nd to 5th April.
For news; http://www.rallydeportugal.pt/

The 12th and final round of the 2009 FIA World Rally Championship is Wales Rally GB starting in Cardiff on Thursday 22nd October.

Ends.