Solberg holds off Loeb

Lisbon - Norway's Petter Solberg is the early leader of the Rally of Portugal after winning the opening stage here in a Ford on Thursday.

On the 3.27 km course in front of the city's famous Jeronimos Monastery, Solberg finished one tenth of a second ahead of French eight-time world champion Sebastien Loeb (Citroen), with Finnish duo Jari-Matti Latvala (Ford) and Mikko Hirvonen (Citroen) both seven-tenths adrift.

There will be three night-time stages on the race which takes the drivers south to Faro in the Algarve.