Alonso wins while Raikkonen crashes
This Nurburgring Grand Prix may be remembered as one of the most apocalyptic of the season. Just at the beginning of the last lap, Kimi Raikkonen's McLaren has a suspension failure under braking and sees his race ended. Fernando Alonso was exstatic about his win. He is joined on the podium by Heidfeld and Barrichello.
At the start immediately it came to a major incident in the first corner. At first there was Webber who hit Montoya with both men spinning off the track. Montoya would rejoin while Webber could walk home. Just behind them, Ralf Schumacher was unable to stop in time and hit the rear wheel of Alonso who had serious problems keeping his car under control.
Both Ferrari's also were hindered a lot, especially Schumacher who was on the outside and was forced to hold off as other cars were sliding off the track before him.
Ralf Schumacher also rejoined the race after getting a new nosecone but he would later spin out of the race.
All this happened after a strange starting procedure. The starting lights remained red for quite a long time after which the pack completed another warmup lap. Jarno Trulli later received a drive through penalty as his engineers were not off the track 15 seconds before the (first) start.
Fisichella was the cause for the second warmup lap as he did not get off the mark. The Roman will eventually end up 6th.
After that start Kimi Raikkonen quickly pulled away with Heidfeld closely behind him. Alonso was 5th at that time as he was running behind Trulli and a well started Coulthard.
As the front runners came in it was clear that the Williams was on a one stop strategy. Trulli had by then made his drive through penalty bringing Coulthard in the lead just in front of Alonso.
The pace of the Renault increased steadily as he was on the longest first stint from the front runners. He came back on track after his first stop in third position 20 seconds behind Raikkonen - Hiedfeld.
Alonso was on a high after Raikkonen ended up missing several corners and set a new lap record just before he had to come in. It wasn't however all beauty as he also lost 5 seconds because of a trip into the gravel at the Dunlop hairpin.
Towards the end of the race at was clear that Raikkonen was having problems with the tires after the Finn had flatspotted his right front tire by blocking that wheel heavily several times in the first corner. After Heidfeld and Barrichello stopped for their third refuelling, Alonso was only 10 seconds behind the leading McLaren with 15 laps to go.
When both leaders came across the finish line, the difference between both was only 1.5 seconds. Alonso kept pushing hard to not allow Kimi to hold down a little. It eventually paid off just after that as Kimi's suspension failed. He had been running with a highly vibrating car and crashed out most likely because of those vibrations with a suspension failure that followed a small spark in his front right wheel.
The Spanish championship leader now increases his lead to Raikkonen with another 10 points.
Coulthard should also be accounted a very good race finishing 4th with his Red Bull. The Scot could have even been on the podium had he not received a drive through for speeding in the pitlane.
Here are the complete results:
1 F. Alonso Renault 1:31:46.648
2 N. Heidfeld Williams + 16.567
3 R. Barrichello Ferrari + 18.549
4 D. Coulthard Red Bull + 31.588
5 M. Schumacher Ferrari + 50.445
6 G. Fisichella Renault + 51.932
7 JP. Montoya McLaren + 58.173
8 J. Trulli Toyota + 1:11.091
9 V. Liuzzi Red Bull + 1:11.529
10 J. Button BAR + 1:35.786
11 K. Räikkönen McLaren + 1 laps
12 T. Sato BAR + 1 laps
13 J. Villeneuve Sauber + 1 laps
14 F. Massa Sauber + 1 laps
15 T. Monteiro Jordan + 1 laps
16 N. Karthikeyan Jordan + 1 laps
17 C. Albers Minardi + 2 laps
18 P. Friesacher Minardi + 3 laps
Did not finish
19 R. Schumacher Toyota + 25 laps
20 M. Webber Williams + 59 laps
