Yes, I was able to remove the clips on the fuel rail without breaking them. I remember there was a tab on the back of the inside of the clip. I can't exactly picture it, but I do still have my beauty covers off, so I should be able to get a pic tomorrow.
For my oil leak, it was coming from under the spark plug inserts (buckets). I removed the lid which exposed the injectors and could see the oil grime under. I had to remove the injectors (1 black bolt + special puller tool) and the buckets (4 bolts) and then it was clear where the leak was. If you look at my pic of engine with VC off, you will see a plug in the head between each spark plug pair. If you look at the center plug (between spark plugs 3 & 4), you will see it's black while the plugs between spark plugs 1 & 2 and 5 & 6 are silver. Well, the black is because that plugged hole is full of oil. I've added a few more pics showing the dis-assembly of the spark plug insert buckets. The first should be familiar as it's what's exposed even with the VC on. The next two are with the "lid" of the bucket removed where you can see the mess.
My VC gasket was actually fine; probably because it was changed with the VANOS recall not too long ago.
Also, as you can see, I ran with the idea of balloons to keep injectors & fuel lines clean
