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Mika Hakkinen Q&A

Mika Hakkinen's third victory of 2000 in Hungary put him into the lead of the World Championship for the first time this season, albeit by just two points. He's been in close fights before; last year he was two points behind Eddie Irvine after Hungary, and in 1998 he was seven points clear of Michael Schumacher at the same stage. On both occasions he clinched the title at the final round. The cards seem to be falling in his favour at the moment, and despite losing out to David Coulthard in qualifying recently he has shown the better form on race day - especially at the start



"It was very tough indeed. It was OK when I was pushing really hard all the time, but then about 25 laps before the end I started cruising, and I didn't push too much! When that happens you then you relax your muscles, and when you do that you start moving in the seat. You start getting cramps in different places, and it becomes really difficult. So quite a tough day."



"Absolutely, this circuit is all about the start. Yeah, it's going well at the moment. I went side-by-side with Michael into the first corner and we didn't touch and we didn't go off. So it was very pleasant racing."



"It's OK, it's a nice feeling, but it's just the situation at the moment. I'll try to stay cool and not get too excited about the situation. There's a long way to go. We still have many races in front of us, and the next GP could be different again. But I'm feeling comfortable, I'm feeling confident. The team is behind me 100 per cent, and behind David of course, so we're strong."



"There are a lot of Finns in the grandstands, a lot of Finnish flags, so the atmosphere was great. It felt really good. There are about 25,000 here. I'm sure it's a great celebration for them."



"Set-up is very critical. With today's cars 1mm can make a huge difference to the balance of the car. You have to get everything right. And we got everything right for the Sunday, for the race. We made changes for what we thought was right. I'm happy. The team did a great job, and I'm very glad for the engineers. Our car was like a rocket. It was very, very fast."

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