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[29/08/04 - 16:13]

Raikkonen wins while Schumacher is Champion
Belgian GP - Race

Kimi Raikkonen won an incident filled 44-lap Belgian Grand Prix to claim his first victory of the season with McLaren Mercedes, while Michael Schumacher finished in second position to claim his seventh drivers’ title in Ferrari’s 700th Grand Prix.

Raikkonen starting in tenth position, made an impressive start to the race, immediately moving up the order to challenge the leaders. The first round of pitstops saw him emerge in the lead and on pure pace today, no one could challenge the Finn for the victory, despite a downshift problem with his MP4-19B.

Schumacher’s second position ahead of team-mate Barrichello gave him the two World Championship points he needed to clinch the title. It was another gritty determined drive from Schumacher as for once, Ferrari did not have the car to dominate the event.

Rubens Barrichello did what he could to finish in third position, but his position does not tell the full story in this incident filled race.

The start of the 44-lap race saw Jarno Trulli lead away from Pole Position with Fernando Alonso slotting into second position in the second Renault. David Coulthard bullied his way past Schumacher into La Source to run third. Behind the leaders, Barrichello was hit hard by Mark Webber, breaking his rear wing in the process.

As the field filed through Eau Rouge for the first time, Webber, now minus his front wing, clipped the back of Takuma Sato’s BAR Honda, sending the Japanese driver into a half spin. With Sato broadside across the circuit with broken suspension, Webber careered onto the run off area with broken front suspension and Gianmaria Bruni took avoiding action planting Minardi nose first into the tyre wall. Giorgio Pantano then ran into the side of Bruni, ending his day before it had really started.

The safety car was deployed for the first time and the field, minus four runners, lined up for the restart.

Trulli continued to lead at the restart but was one of the first drivers to pit for fuel, handing the race lead over to team-mate Alonso. The Spaniard took the lead with Raikkonen already up into the second position. Lap 12 saw Alonso spin of into retirement as his Renault engine doused the rear wheel in oil. Kimi Raikkonen now had the lead of the race and one lap later he made his first stop, emerging ahead of Jarno Trulli and back in the lead.

From that point onwards, Raikkonen controlled the pace at the front with Schumacher pushing hard to stay in contact.

The second safety car period came about as a result of Jenson Button suffering a high speed tyre failure approaching Les Combes. The BAR Honda driver, running fourth at the time, has his right rear Michelin fail, sending him sharply across the track and into the side of the unfortunate Zsolt Baumgartner. With more debris littering the circuit, the safety car was deployed giving Schumacher the chance to try once again for the lead.

Through all the carnage, Felipe Massa brought his Sauber Petronas home in fourth position, scoring valuable points for the Swiss team. Despite an off-track moment that damaged his Sauber, Giancarlo Fisichella finished in fifth position ahead of Christian Klien in the Jaguar.

Klien was fortunate to finish the race at all, as in the closing stages of the event, Coulthard, battling his way back through the field after a Michelin tyre failure, clipped the back of the R5 as he lined up a passing attempt exiting Eau Rouge. With tremendous luck, Coulthard’s McLaren did not flip over, but simply brushed the concrete retaining wall on the left and continued back to the pits for new tyres and front wing. Klien was able to continue to score his first championship points in his career.

David Coulthard amazingly battled back to finish in seventh position in his McLaren. It was a brave race from Coulthard and one that certainly should have yielded more than two championship points.

Olivier Panis was the final points scorer in eighth position. The Frenchman gained the position ironically from his own team-mate Ricardo Zonta's misfortune. Zonta had worked his way up from last on the grid to fourth position. Only lap 42 of the 44 lap race, Zonta’s Toyota V10 blew as he climbed the hill towards Les Combes. It was a sad end to a great race from the Brazilian.

Jarno Trulli led early on but lost pace in his Renault. A tangle with Montoya whilst battling for position lost him further ground and the Italian finally finished in a distant ninth position. With Alonso already out of the race, the only consolation for Renault is that neither BAR Honda finished the race either.

Nick Heidfeld was the final runner in 11th position, his Jordan Ford way off the leaders pace. Heidfeld was classified behind Zonta who took tenth position despite his engine failure.

Over at BMW Williams, it was a case of disappointment. All was going well until the closing stages, with Antonio Pizzonia running in third position with Montoya right on his tail. Pizzonia, in what is probably his final race for the team, suffered a gearbox failure and retired, while Montoya was another driver to suffer a Michelin tyre failure, bringing his FW26 back to the pits and climbing out. At BAR Honda, Sato was eliminated on lap one following a nudge from Mark Webber, while Button suffered a puncture and crashed out.

It was a well deserved victory for both Kimi Raikkonen and Champion Michael Schumacher. The event provided plenty of action and entertainment, but once again, just like at Indianapolis, questions need to be asked about on track debris and the use of safety cars rather than stopping the event to clear the circuit of debris.

The F1 circus packs up now and heads to Monza for the Italian Grand Prix. The land of Ferrari....

Earl ALEXANDER
CAPSIS International

Posted: Sun Aug 29, 2004 6:54 pm Post subject:

Twas a good race. Missed it live but managed to watch the highlights.

Posted: Sun Aug 29, 2004 7:23 pm Post subject:

There were rather a lot of crashes. The highest-paid drivers on the planet should take a bit more care of their expensive machines. Less than half of them finished the race.

Posted: Sun Aug 29, 2004 9:49 pm Post subject:

JustAnEngineer wrote:
There were rather a lot of crashes. The highest-paid drivers on the planet should take a bit more care of their expensive machines. Less than half of them finished the race.

Bah as if they care bout it, its not comming out of their pockets anyway and the sponsors have a lot of it to dish out.