Sebastien Loeb swept the board on day two of the Rally Portugal, racing to six stage wins out of six behind the wheel of the dominant Citroen C4 WRC.
The Frenchman began the day down in third place, 18 seconds behind overnight leader Mikko Hirvonen, but an inspired display saw Loeb hit the front on stage nine before opening up a lead of nearly 27 seconds heading into the final leg.

The margin of Loeb's lead could be key on the final leg, with the Citroen star set to clear away the loose dirt for his rivals as the first car on track on Sunday. "It's been a very good day for me," said the five-time champion.
"I did all I could to increase my lead. The road-cleaning effect was inconsistent, with some stages cleaning more than others, but the most important thing is we have a good lead for tomorrow. Maybe it's not going to be enough to balance being first on the road, because tomorrow's stages are a bit more twisty and dusty, we'll just have to wait and see. But overall I couldn't have hoped for better."

Hirvonen ended the day in second place overall after struggling to match the searing pace of Loeb, who is bidding to maintain his perfect start to 2009 with a fourth win in succession.
BP Ford team leader Hirvonen, meanwhile, admitted that his times - and tyres - had suffered as a result of being the first competitor to tackle the stages today. "I did all I can on this stage but my tyres are finished," he said at the end of stage 13. "But tomorrow is a long day and I will have a cleaner road position than Sebastien. As long as I don't have any problems with dust in the air or anything like that, there's still a chance of catching him. I'll try. There's no other option."

Loeb's team-mate Dani Sordo finished the second day in a lonely third place, well behind the battle for the lead and over a minute clear of fourth-placed man Petter Solberg, who again impressed in a privateer Citroen Xsara.

Matthew Wilson held off Stobart Ford team-mate Henning Solberg to claim fifth, although the Briton will do well to hold onto that place tomorrow as the Norwegian closed to within a second after trailing at one stage by almost half a minute.
"Henning has been chasing hard; its going to be a struggle to keep him behind tomorrow," said Wilson. "But it's okay. I've kept the good feeling in the car we had in Cyprus, and we're hoping to get fifth tomorrow."

Evgeny Novikov (Citroen) and Mads Ostberg (Subaru) finished seventh and eight respectively, while Marcus Grönholm's impressive return to the WRC turned sour on today's opening stage when he crashed out of fourth place.
The former world champion damaged the front of his Subaru Impreza after running wide and hitting a tree. Although he recovered to race for a further five kilometres, overheating forced the veteran to call it a day.
"It's disappointing for me and for the team because we wanted a nice result from here," said Gronholm. "I have not been rallying for a long time and coming back starting behind Seb (Loeb) and trying to do the same time in a new car, is not so easy," he elaborated. "We were on the pace yesterday and pushing today, and I made a small mistake."

Grönholm could return to the track under SupeRally rules on Sunday if his Prodrive team are able to repair the damage overnight.