Heidfeld laments missed podium finish

The BMW Sauber was running strongly and even led for a lap until he made his first pitstop, where he lost a wheel nut and had to lap slowly for a lap before making another stop.

The problem dropped him out of contention, and later on he retired with a mechanical problem.

Without the problems, the German reckons he would have been third.

"In the end it was most likely a gearbox problem that stopped me, but unfortunately my race was over much earlier after the problem during my first pitstop," he said. "For some reason the front right wheel was loose, we have to look at it how this happened. For the first 24 laps until this stop it looked superb for me.

"I drove a long first stint and my second stint would also have been a long one. On top of this Alonso was not very quick on the harder tyres in his second stint. I believe I had the chance to finish on the podium today."

Heidfeld, who had finished in fourth place in the first three races of the season, was replaced in that position by teammate Robert Kubica, who also ran strongly to score his best result of the year.

"I am very satisfied because this is my first race this season without any problems, and you can see the result," said Kubica. "Today everything came together for me. I could fight for top places, and that is what I did today.

"I had quite a good, consistent race, although I had some problems with tyre degradation in the second stint when I was behind Alonso and Coulthard was closing the gap, but everything was under control.

"In the end, after the second pitstop, I tried to push and make the gap to Coulthard bigger. Now we have to continue working in this direction."