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Breen tops Citroën trio in Belgium

Craig Breen claimed victory at the Belgian Championship Rallye du Condroz at the weekend, beating a field that included his 2017 team-mate Stéphane Lefebvre and his team boss, Yves Matton.

Citroën Racing has close ties with the Rallye du Condroz, and proud Belgian Matton has driven one of his team's World Rally Cars there for the last four years.

Citroën's WRC drivers have made guest appearances too, and in 2013 Sébastien Loeb won the event in a DS 3 WRC with his wife, Severine, as co-driver.

This year Matton was at the wheel of a C4 WRC, alongside co-driver Antoine Podgorny, while his WRC crews of Breen and Scott Martin, and Lefebvre and Xavier Portier, drove DS 3 R5s.

Breen was quickest out of the blocks, and the Irishman was soon locked in a tense duel for the lead with the Belgian Cédric Cherain in a Škoda Fabia R5.

But after Cherain made a mistake and retired on Saturday's final stage, Breen was in a class of his own, and took the win by 24.2sec, having set fastest time on seven of the 22 stages.

Lefebvre was second, and began the rally on the back foot after missing shakedown and the opportunity to get the measure of the asphalt stages. Later in the event his pace suffered after he had to swap to a spare gearbox with different gear ratios.

Matton ended the event with a string of stage wins to bring his C4 home in fifth place - matching his 2015 result.

Zdroj: wrc.com