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First season in its entirety by Sébastien Loeb in the World Rally Championship, 2003 is also the year of its tenure within the Citroën Sport structure. The young Alsatian hope was then joined by two new teammates, Carlos Sainz and Colin McRae, former world champions of the discipline and record winners. With three rallies won and seven podiums, he finished second in the championship at a point in the crown, dropping the title at Petter Solberg on team instructions during the British rally, the final round of the calendar. He won a few weeks later in the Champions Race for the first time in his career against double world champion Marcus Grönholm.

World Rally Championship
The year 2003 marks the formalisation of Citroën Sport's commitment to the WRC Builders Championship, and is therefore the first full season in the world for the chevron brand. Determined to challenge the supremacy of the team sister Peugeot, a triple champion in title, and to play at least one of the crowns at stake, the French team is able to build its ambitions by recruiting two former world champions in its ranks, Colin McRae and Carlos Sainz, already teammates at Ford in 2002. With its promising results over the past season, including a first world victory, Sébastien Loeb continues to collaborate with the brand that discovered it and is offered full-time tenure on the third Xsara. The initial objective for the Alsatian is then to draw on the experience of his prestigious elders to complete his apprenticeship and gradually return to the circle of leading pilots.

Rallye Automobile Monte-Carlo
The start of the season was given as part of the Monte-Carlo rally, which Loeb won the previous year for his first participation in the queen category before being downgraded following a misinterpretation of the rules by Citroën. On a cautious pace, the Frenchman took fourth place in the general standings at the end of the first two stages and conceded a deficit of almost a minute over the reigning world champion Marcus Grönholm, who had an optimal choice of tyres. The Alsatian scored his first time scratch in the next chrono, taking up fifteen seconds in the Finns, before rising to second place after Colin McRae's miscarriage and a late penalty for the young Norwegian Petter Solberg. The four-time winner of the Tommi Mäkinen race gave up on his way out after losing control of his Subaru Impreza in a frozen area. Loeb finally removed the last two scratches from the first stage and reduced his delay on Grönholm to twenty seconds when he reached the closed park. The first special of the second