UpdateF1 >> Formula 1 News > Hamilton wins at home

Action filled wet race

As the pack lined up on the grid with light rain falling, the capacity Silverstone crowd, braving the cool and breezy conditions, had no idea of the way this race would unfold.

Ross Brawn – the Honda supremo – had said that the rain should stop soon after the start, but that more was expected later on. He reckoned, so he said, that these conditions were ideal for those at the back, the two Honda RA108’s included, to make amends for their poor starting position. Even he, brilliant strategist that he is, could not have known just how right he would be.

At the start Heikki Kovalainen got away nicely from pole position, with Mark Webber a little slower away and moving across to defend against Kimi Raikkonen on his left. He went the wrong way, for while the Ferrari managed to make it past the Red Bull, Lewis Hamilton came storming off the grid on Webbers right hand side, and duly slotted into second behind his teammate.

Perhaps slotted in is a little unfair, for Hamilton was attacking from the off, forcing Kovalainen into some very robust moves to keep him behind, but even at this early point one sensed that Hamilton was the faster of the two McLaren’s.

Very soon after the start we got an indication of things to come when Webber lost the Red Bull and ended up facing the wrong way. He would go on to recover with a series of moves that took him back into the mid-field, but that was the end of any chance of a good result for the Australian. A pity, for this is a man who has not put a foot wrong all season, and to slip up here must have been particularly galling.

Webber was far from alone, however, as very soon after his spin no other than Felipe Massa performed a copycat manoeuvre in the Ferrari. Massa would figure no more, and we lost count of the number of times the Brazilian spun over the next 60 laps. He finished last and lapped.

Also in the wars in the early stages were David Coulthard and Sebastian Vettel, the two touching and spinning off in a synchronised move into retirement, and also Kazuki Nakajima who had a quick run across the grass in the opening laps.

At the front Hamilton was harrying Kovalainen very forcefully indeed, and is was not long before the Englishman lined up the Finn in to Stowe and appeared to cruise past. He pulled away from then on, and Kovalainen clearly had nothing in return.

Flying in the early laps was Fernando Alonso, the Renault picking off Nick Heidfeld and setting a string of fastest laps, and on the tenth lap the weather got the better of Kovalainen, the McLaren dropping behind both Kovalainen and Alonso into fourth position.

Adrian Sutil retired at this point, too, any chance of a repeat of his wet-weather performance at Monaco thrown away, but he was by no means disgraced as by now Massa had spun at least twice. As the rain eased Heidfeld – now in fifth – began to pick up pace a little, and notably Kimi Raikkonen began to take great chunks out of Hamilton’s lead. What was six second at lap ten became less than half of that a few laps later – clearly the Ferrari was working better in the drying conditions.
Webber was the first to pit on lap 19, and set a precedent by taking on fuel but not changing the intermediate tyres on the Red Bull. Presumably, the thinking was that the tyres would last another stint, given that no more significant rain fell before the second stop.

Kovalainen followed him in a lap later, the McLaren taking on new intermediates, and Alonso a lap down the line, the Renault opting to stay on the same tyre, as had Webber.

Hamilton headed to the pits at the end of lap 21, with Raikkonen – by now just a second behind – following him in. Lewis changed tyres, Kimi did not, and Ferrari must be ruing the decision to this day, for shortly after the two emerged from the stops, in the same order, the heavens opened and hard rain began to fall.

Heidfeld was next in, the BMW taking on new tyres, and Piquet – running very nicely for Renault – also made his first stop of the day.

Up front Hamilton was now four and a half seconds ahead of Raikkonen and clearly lapping quicker, the fresh rubber giving an advantage the Ferrari did not have with its worn tyres, and Heidfeld began to make people take notice by making a move on Timo Glock behind whom he had emerged from the pits, and taking in Alonso in the same manoeuvre. The BMW did not have the peace of the McLaren, but this was a tremendous drive in progress from Heidfeld, with more to come.

With the rain falling harder now, those on old tyres – among them Raikkonen, Alonso and Webber – found they were miles off the pace, and this was displayed perfectly when Hamilton proceeded to pullout an extra fifteen seconds over Raikkonen over the course of three laps. Alonso was passed by teammate Piquet, to, and Webber simply had no chance back in the pack.

Kovalainen was having a hard time of things, too, as his McLaren simply did not seem to have the pace of Hamilton’s, but he had more than Raikkonen and soon found himself right up behind the Ferrari. What Heikki seemed not to notice was that Heidfeld was also glued to the back of the McLaren, and when Kovalainen made his move on the Ferrari, Heidfeld followed him through – and then simply drove past the McLaren, too!

At half distance, then. Hamilton led Heidfeld by over 20 seconds, and was clearly quicker than the BMW. Heidfeld had eight seconds over Kovalainen, and was pulling away, and Raikkonen was a rapidly extending ten seconds behind the McLaren.

Raikkonen stopped on lap thirty, taking on new intermediates, and soon after this Robert Kubica – who had started ninth in the second BMW – cleanly took Kovalainen to make it blue and white cars second and third. Kovalainen made a second stop a few laps after Raikkonen, while the rain was ever harder now resulting in ‘offs’ from Glock, Kubica, Piquet – terminally – and no less than Hamilton, too.

Around this point a queue formed at the Honda pit, the team opting to bring both drivers in for full wet tyres. It was a masterstroke, for while Jenson Button lasted only a couple of laps more and then retired, Rubens Barrichello began lapping a t a rate of seven, sometimes more, seconds a lap quicker than everyone else. The Honda rapidly hauled in everything in front of it, and when Hamilton stopped for the final time on lap 38 – along with second placed Heidfeld, then Kubica, Rubens found himself in fourth position, with Hamilton, Heidfeld and a late stopping Jarno Trulli in front of him. Trulli went to the pits and got out of his way, and Barrichello soon made easy work of Heidfeld.

The other BMW had gone by this point, Kubica falling foul of the conditions, while Raikkonen spun again, as did Webber, and probably Massa, too, although we had stopped counting by this point.

With 18 laps left the rain abated, and the sun began to shine on Silverstone. Hamilton had things wrapped up by now, the McLaren miles ahead of Barrichello, while Rubens had to stop again with 13 laps left, the fuel rig having failed to fill the car at his previous stop. This left Heidfeld a clear second – a minute behind Hamilton, and twenty seconds ahead of the Honda.

The rest of the race was a frantic scrap between the points players, with Kovalainen spinning once more and falling behind Alonso and Raikkonen, then fighting hard to take the place back from the Renault but by the then his countryman in the Ferrari was long gone, and Nakajima attempting to close on this fight but finding himself jumped by Trulli on the final lap.

Hamilton cruised home a deserved winner, with Heidfeld an equally deserved, if very distant, second having driven a very feisty race indeed, and Barrichello a delighted and quite amazing third from the very back end of the grid.

Fourth, and lapped, was a remarkable result for Raikkonen, but he should have been higher up. Ferrari made the wrong call at the first stop – as did Renault for Alonso and red Bull for Webber – and fifth will be a great disappointment for Kovalainen, who simply did not have the pace of his team mate.

Alonso also fell foul of a wrong call by his team, and was lucky to salvage sixth position, while Trulli somehow wrenched seventh off Nakajima – another good result for him – on the last lap.

The remaining runners were Rosberg, who started from the pit lane and finished right behind his team mate, Webber, who threw it away on lap one in the one race he did not want to do so, Sebastien Bourdais, Glock, and a forlorn and out of sorts Felipe Massa.

The championship table is now a three way tie, with Hamilton, Raikkonen and Massa all on 48 points, Kubica a couple behind them, and Heidfeld not far behind after a fine drive today. But this was Lewis Hamilton’s race, without any doubt at all.

Written: Sun, 06 Jul 2008 14:41:25