Schuey cruises to German GP victory

An excellent start and early segment, helped by the fact that Juan Pablo Montoya's Williams made an awful start from the front row and Fernando Alonso's Renault briefly headed Kimi Raikkonen's McLaren, allowed him to extend an early 3sec lead. But McLaren is a very different animal thesedays. Raikkonen repassed Alonso at the hairpin on lap two, and when Michael made his first stop as early as lap 10 (which went some way to explain his stunning qualifying pace) Raikkonen got the hammer down and set a stunning fastest lap.

Schuey was delayed exiting his stop by a car coming past his pit, losing him a couple of seconds, which meant Raikkonen was right on his tail when he rejoined from his stop a lap later. In fact, Schumacher only took about 6secs of fuel, whereas Raikkonen received almost 9secs worth. Kimi looked like he could rain on Schuey's parade after all.

That became academic, however, when the main plane of Raikkonen's rear wing flew off on the 185mph approach to Turn 1 two laps later. The McLaren snapped to the right, and thankfully the changes made to the corner in recent years meant Kimi had more run-off to scrub off speed before he slammed into the tyrewall, just a few feet away from where he ended his race last year.

It was a frightening moment, but Raikkonen was unhurt. He unloaded his frustration by hurling the steering wheel into the cockpit (no doubt the FIA fine will follow) but found the time to pick up a dropped marshal's cap and hand it back to him, better behaviour than he displayed in Bahrain.

"It's a shame as I was catching Michael before the pitstop," said Raikkonen. "I was in a very strong position."

Speaking later, Schumacher said of Raikkonen's threat: "Kimi was right behind and was quick, no doubt about it, but I think you have the general trend between the tyre manufacturers that you have certain stages in the race when one is quicker than the other, then it's the other way around later, so I was not too worried as long as he was behind me."

A charging Jenson Button now took up the lead, despite his 13th slot starting spot and losing time at Turn 1 avoiding BAR team-mate Takuma Sato. He pitted on lap 15, which showed that his third fastest time in qualifying yesterday was one heck of an effort. Had a safety car been called upon to sweep up the Raikkonen debris, he would have got a 'free' pitstop... Jarno Trulli would have preferred a safety car too, as he picked up a chunk of Raikkonen's front wing under his Renault, which ruined both his aerodynamic balance and his race. He would finish 11th.

Schumacher now held a 10sec lead over Alonso, David Coulthard (whom McLaren elected to keep in the dark over the cause of Raikkonen's exit) and Montoya, who pulled off a great move to pass Mark Webber's Jaguar on the exit of the Spitzkehre hairpin on lap three. Button was up to fifth, and looked hungry for more.

Montoya made life easy for him, running wide in the Mercedes Arena as he struggled with blistered rear tyres and gifting Button fourth. Attention was also focused on Trulli's struggle, and the damaged Renault fell prey to Sato (insanely brave move on the grass to grab the inside line at the 180mph Parabolika) and Webber (brilliantly optimistic lunge) at the hairpin. Sato would then blot his copybook by spinning at Mobil Kurve, allowing Webber to grab sixth.

For the second round of stops, Button again pitted later than those running ahead of him, which allowed him to pound in some stunning laptimes. He resumed right behind Alonso, having leapfrogged ahead of Coulthard.

Jenson got stuck into Fernando's defences, twice drawing alongside the Spaniard on the exit of the hairpin, but twice being blown away by its superior traction on the drag race into the Merc Arena. BAR technical director Geoff Willis noted: "We were surprised by that as well. We either don't have the mid-range [power], or maybe they have a traction advantage there."

Whatever the reason, Button appeared to damage his tyres during his attacks and he dropped almost 3secs back before his third and final stop. This time he stopped just a couple of laps later than Alonso, which meant that Jenson rejoined behind him once more.

Again Button attacked, lunging ahead at the hairpin. Again Alonso repelled him on the exit, but this time Jenson wasn't to be denied. Having been a little cagey into the Merc Arena on a previous occasion, this time Button shoved his BAR down the inside of the Renault, and Alonso sensibly deferred.

Button's only problems now were: 1) How to catch Schumacher, over 10secs ahead and 2) His helmet had come loose and was strangling him on the high-speed sections! His high-tech solution (or a superb bit of improvisation depending on how you look at it) was to hold the side of his helmet with his left hand on the straights...

He was never going to catch Schumacher, who admitted after the race that he was a little concerned about Button's strategy: "It was a little bit difficult, especially at the beginning as Jenson was staying out after first his pitstop and I wasn't sure if maybe he was on a two-stop strategy. It was a tough race, not knowing what was going on at several stages of the race."

Button said: "It's difficult because I'm so happy to finish second and for me it's the best drive of my career and I had the best car underneath me and it performed fantastically and the engine too. But it's slightly disappointing because if I had started third it could have been a different story. I could have put a lot more pressure on Michael, which I would have enjoyed very much! But that was not to be, we've got to wait for that, but all in all it's a fantastic result and I've got to say a big thank you to the team."

Of his helmet problems, Jenson said: "The team thought it was the visor but it was the strap underneath the helmet that was a little bit loose and the problem is then that the helmet lifts up slightly and it was really catching on my throat. It made it very difficult to breathe so I had to hold it on every straight so that I could keep it down so that I could get some air in."

After being passed by Button, Alonso began to struggle and fell back into the clutches of Coulthard. But just as the McLaren was in striking distance, Fernando clobbered a kerb and his handling woes suddenly vanished.

"At the beginning I thought it was a problem with the front wing, I thought something was broken there," he said. And then I thought it was a suspension problem as it was impossible to turn in and I did three slow laps and Coulthard was very close. I even called the pits to come in and check it, but they said stay out to take some points. So I was really worried at that stage but then I don't know what happened, I went over the kerb at Turn 6 and the car went back to normal!"

Coulthard fell away again, and was not happy with his fourth place finish: "I wish I could say I was [pleased with the race] but I'm not. I picked up some damage when Rubens [Barrichello] hit me at the hairpin which broke the rear wing endplate and I picked up more damage when I hit the debris from Kimi. The engineers worked quite hard to adjust the car in the pitstops to dial-out the understeer the car had."

Montoya finished fifth, 23secs behind the race winner - a far cry from last year when he won by over a minute. Webber just held off the charge of the second Williams of Antonio Pizzonia, who passed Sato with a couple of laps remaining but couldn't do anything about his former team-mate. Sato picked up the final point on offer, ahead of the two-stopping Giancarlo Fisichella (Sauber), Christian Klien (Jaguar) and Trulli.

While Schumacher soaked up the adulation of his home fans, Ferrari team-mate Rubens Barrichello had little to cheer. He clipped the back of Coulthard's McLaren at the hairpin on the opening lap, losing his front wing. He struggled for pace throughout, and his misery was compounded when he sustained a left-rear puncture on the final lap, dropping him to 12th.

If only Michael had days like that too...