WRC 2018: Sebastien Ogier beats Ott Tanak by almost a minute to Monte Carlo Rally win

Defending five-time WRC champion, Sebastien Ogier of M-Sport Ford has started his title defence by winning the season-opening Monte Carlo rally by almost a minute over Toyota's Ott Tanak.

The Frenchman piloted his Fiesta WRC through the snow and ice covered tarmac roads that lined the course of the rally that started on Thursday and concluded today with the powerstage at the famous Col de Turini stage.

In addition to the tricky surface there was also an additional scare of a light flare lit up by a spectator causing smoke to obscure the Frenchman's vision in one of the stages as well as reports of snow being thrown on to the rally course.

Keeping Ogier honest but ultimately unable to catch up to him was Ott Tanak in his factory Toyota Yaris WRC.

A sterner challenge to Ogier has been expected from Hyundai's Andreas Mikkelsen, but the Norwegian was left out of the running of the rally as early as Friday due to a broken alternator belt on his i20 WRC.

Hyundai was M-Sport Ford and Ogier's main opposition last year with Belgium's Thierry Neuville leading the charge, but he could manage just fifth place by the end of the rally, and ended up almost five minutes behind Ogier in the overall standing.

Ogier and also Tanak were pretty much in a league of their own, as the second placed Toyota driver finished almost a minute ahead of his teammate Jari-Matti Latvala, who was third in the overall classification.

One hopes to see the two battle hard for the WRC crown this year, and hopefully Mikkelsen too will join the party. In the WRC-2 category that runs R5 specification cars like the one that Gaurav Gill drives in the Asia-Pacific Rally Championship, Skoda Motorsport dominated with Jan Kopecky winning by over five minutes ahead of Kalle Rovanperra.

Rovanperra has often been called the 'Max Verstappen of WRC' on account of his early start. The Finn is just 17-years-old and won the WRC-2 class of Rally Australia last year.