France's reigning four-time world champion Sebastien Loeb led after Thursday's opening super special stage of the Rally of Finland which he has never won.

Loeb, a veteran of 41 rally wins but never in Finland, got this year's challenge off to a good start as he led by 0.3sec from Spain's Dani Sordo and by 0.4sec from both Mikko Hirvonen of Finland and Australia's Chris Atkinson in the 2km timed section.

The rally, the ninth leg of the 2008 world championship, starts in earnest on Friday with 10 special stages and 129 kilometres of timed sections around Jyvaskyla to the north west of Helsinki.

AFP