Marcus Gronholm had won four of the six stages on day one

Gronholm had been leading the event by 40 seconds when he hit a rock, which caused an oil leak and ended his rally.

As a result, Loeb moved into a two-minute lead at the end of Saturday's action.

He is two minutes and 17 seconds clear of closest challenger Mikko Hirvonen, with Daniel Sordo lying third.

Loeb dominated proceedings once Gronholm had bowed out on stage eight, winning four of the day's six stages.

The Frenchman seems certain to win unless he suffers a similar fate to Gronholm.

Ford team director Malcolm Wilson admitted Gronholm's departure was a big disappointment.

"Everything was going to plan and Marcus was controlling his pace according to Sebastien Loeb's split times," said Wilson.

"On the positive side, the performance of the Focus has been the best we have had all season and we have seen that it is good on the rough and difficult stages."

Henning Solberg, elder brother of Petter, saw his hopes of a top-three finish dashed when he was forced to stop on stage nine with mechanical problems.

Another driver struggling on Saturday was Chris Atkinson, who damaged his Subaru in a heavy landing on stage eight. He remains in fifth despite the incident.

English rookie Matthew Wilson is off the bottom spot but still remains 52 minutes behind Frenchman Loeb.