With a a big crowd inf ront, the cars started in reverse order with two cars racing side-by-side on a specially created circuit in the centre of the stadium.
Henning Solberg advanced into battle with Citroen driver Dani Sordo and in a scintillating race over the 2.21km course the Norwegian and co-driver Cato Menkerud edged out the Spaniard by 0.1 seconds.
It is the first time that Solberg has led a WRC event.

Stobart team-mates Matthew Wilson and Scott Martin lined up in the stadium with Petter Solberg but were beaten by the resurgent former world champion, finishing the winding tarmac course 1.8 seconds behind. The Briton lies in 11th place.

On Friday, the rally moves into the hills north of the Service Park where the drivers will tackle 136.21km of competitive distance over two identical loops of three stages.

WRC Vodafone Rally de Portugal - top SSE1 timetable:

1- Henning Solberg-Cato Menkerud (Ford Focus RS WRC 2008), 2’09”6
2- Daniel Sordo-Marc Martí (Citroën C4 WRC), +0”1
3- Mikko Hirvonen-Jarmo Lehtinen (Ford Focus RS WRC 2008) +0”2
4- Sébastien Loeb-Daniel Elena (Citroën C4 WRC) +1”2
5- Jari-Matti Latvala-Miikka Anttila (Ford Focus RS WRC 2008) +2”9
6- Marcus Grönholm-Timo Rautiainen (Subaru Impreza WRC2008) +4”5
7- Federico Villagra-José Díaz (Ford Focus RS WRC 2008) +5”6
8- Petter Solberg-Phil Mills (Citroën Xsara WRC) +5”9
9- Mads Ostberg-Ole–Kristian Unnerud (Subaru Impreza WRC2008) +7”0
10- Sébastien Ogier-Julien Ingrassia (Citroen C4 WRC) +7”3