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Brilliant drive paves way to overnight lead.

Sébastien Ogier proved once again this afternoon why he is World Champion.

Sébastien Ogier (Polo R WRC #1) had every reason to be happy with his day's work. "Today was my best day since I started driving in the World Championship," said the delighted Frenchman at the end of Friday's leg - on a day that saw him open the route and consequently battle with dustier roads than anyone else. "I pushed as hard as possible in really difficult conditions, and without making a mistake. I am obviously particularly pleased that I played my joker with this morning's tyre selection, which paid off 100 per cent. Sure it was a risk, but I had tried that set-up during the Shakedown, so I knew that it worked."

At the end of the first leg, the World Champion led his team-mate Jari-Matti Latvala (Polo R WRC #2) by 13.5 seconds. "That is far better than I expected. I actually expected to be 30 to 40 seconds behind Jari-Matti at this point," said Ogier.

Latvala's mood has improved significantly since this morning: "The afternoon was much better," said the Finn, who received mental support from an unexpected source. "As well as my race engineer Fabrice van Ertvelde, Sébastien's wife Andrea also gave me a real lift during the midday break." However, despite two stage wins he was only able to close the gap on leader Ogier by a mere 2.3 seconds. "I fear I may already have lost too much time to Séb to really mount a serious challenge."

Andreas Mikkelsen (Polo R WRC #9) was embroiled in an exciting duel with his fellow Norwegian Mads Østberg (Citroën) for the final podium place. However, he ended the first full day of the rally trailing his compatriot by 15.7 seconds. "The most important thing for me was to get through all the special stages without any problems, in order to get to know the route here in Mexico better."

Ogier must no longer play the role of road sweeper for the rest of the field on the second leg. The rules state that any competitors rejoining under Rally2 conditions after retiring today must start ahead of him. A full six of the World Rally Car drivers are hoping they will be able to return to action on day two.

Driver points yes, team points no.

Why Andreas Mikkelsen is unable to pick up WRC points for his team in Mexico for a second time.

Just like at the Rally Monte Carlo, Andreas Mikkelsen (Polo R WRC #9) is fighting for championship points in the Drivers' standings in Mexico, but not for points in the Teams' standings. The Norwegian - strictly speaking the Volkswagen Motorsport II team - is only nominated for eleven of 13 WRC events in the 2015 season. The reason for this is the plan to also have Mikkelsen compete in a 2015 Polo R WRC as of the Rally Portugal. This would be a logistical nightmare if he would have to respect the rules for being able to pick up points in all WRC rallies.

A brief explanation of the regulations sheds some light on this. Before the start of the season, all officially registered teams need to specify in which WRC events they will use certain vehicle components (differentials, transmission, subframe, steering) more than once. Teams that want to pick up points in all 13 WRC rallies need to observe the following combinations - official term "linked rallies": one combination of four, one combination of three and two pairs.

Logically, rallies of a similar character are linked. For example, the two asphalt rallies in Germany and France. The teams usually select the two extra special WRC rallies in Monte Carlo (asphalt, snow, ice) and Spain (gravel, asphalt) as their "free rallies" - the total of all combinations only adds up to eleven rallies.

Andreas Mikkelsen is not bound by this pattern because he plans to change from the 2014 version of the Polo R WRC to the 2015 version part way through the season. This means that he only needs to link two rallies four times, and has three "free rallies".

The downside is that because Mikkelsen is only nominated for team points for eleven WRC events, he can only take part in eleven days of testing in the 2015 season. Volkswagen Motorsport's first team can make use of a total of 42 days of testing for the two drivers Sébastien Ogier (Polo R WRC #1) and Jari-Matti Latvala (Polo R WRC #2).

The special stages in detail.

SS 11: Dream start for Ogier and Latvala on the second leg.
What a start to the second leg for World Champion Sébastien Ogier (Polo R WRC #1) and runner-up Jari-Matti Latvala (#2). On the eleventh special stage, the 30.27-kilometre Ibarrilla 1, the two Volkswagen drivers were in a league of their own; overall leader Ogier won his fifth special stage at the 2015 Rally Mexico with a time of 17:41.4 minutes, ahead of Latvala who was just 0.2 seconds slower and finished in second. Andreas Mikkelsen (Polo R WRC #9) was sixth on Special Stage 11, but remains fourth in the overall standings, behind Mads Østberg (Citroën).

SS 12: All over for Latvala, Ogier unstoppable.
The outcome of special stage Otates 1 was almost as spectacularly different for team-mates Sébastien Ogier (Polo R WRC #1) and Jari-Matti Latvala (#2) as it could have been. While the World Champion from France set another fantastic time and celebrated his third successive special stage victory, Latvala's dream of a win in Mexico was crushed. About halfway through the course, the Finn slid off the track and lost his left rear wheel. The Volkswagen driver dragged himself across the finish line with a deficit of more than six minutes. This sees Andreas Mikkelsen (Polo R WRC #9) move up into third in the overall standings - behind Mads Østberg (Citroën).

SS 13: Ogier keeps cool, Mikkelsen exerts pressure.
The World Champion remains cool: Volkswagen driver Sébastien Ogier (Polo R WRC #1) didn't take his foot off the gas on the 8.25-kilometre special stage El Brinco 1, despite his closest pursuer Jari-Matti Latvala (#2) retiring. In 4:42.5 minutes, the leader in Mexico got the second-fastest time, trailing stage winner Dani Sordo (Hyundai) by 0.6 seconds. Team-mate Andreas Mikkelsen (Polo R WRC #9) was third, just 0.7 seconds behind Ogier, and now trails second-placed Mads Østberg (Citroën) by just 9.7 seconds in the overall standings in third place and is poised and ready to pounce.

SS 14: Ogier has everything under control on asphalt too.
At the end of the first loop of the second leg, the drivers took to the streets of Léon for the second time. Robert Kubica (Ford) got the win on the short 1.37-kilometre asphalt special stage, Volkswagen driver Sébastien Ogier (Polo R WRC #1) was two tenths of a second slower and finished in joint second alongside Dani Sordo (Hyundai) and Martin Prokop (Ford). Team-mate Andreas Mikkelsen (#9), Mads Østberg (Citroën) and Thierry Neuville (Hyundai) were in joint third place and only a further tenth of a second behind. Ogier now leads the overall standings with an advantage of more than a minute over Østberg, Mikkelsen is lying in wait in third place, 9.7 seconds behind his fellow Norwegian.