Villeneuve says Ralf to blame for crash

The 1997 world champion looked strong throughout the whole race, running in seventh place until he had a problem during his second pitstop which allowed teammate Nick Heidfeld to move ahead.

But with just 11 laps to go, Villeneuve crashed heavily after running over old rubber when trying go lap Toyota driver Ralf Schumacher.

The German slowed down in the middle of the corner, forcing the Canadian to take a different line.

"Ralf Schumacher was running very slowly for quite a few laps and I think he had a problem with his car," said Villeneuve.

"When he decided to let me by it was through a corner. He lifted and just to avoid him I had to go wide where there was old rubber from the tyres - it was like being on an ice rink.

"We were competitive all day, we fought hard but had a problem in the pitstop, which meant Nick jumped us. This was very a shame as we had been ahead of him the whole race, and then lapping Ralf was very frustrating.

"This is always a tough race and sometimes it doesn't work out."

Heidfeld managed to make it to the end of the race and collected two points for his BMW team.

"Unfortunately in the first corner I got stuck in traffic and had to get off the throttle, but in the second corner I was able to overtake two cars," said Heidfeld. "I was then stuck in traffic behind Felipe Massa and Jacques and there was a lot of rubber and dirt off the racing line, which caused problems for a lot of drivers.

"The second pit stop worked very well and the out lap was good, so I gained a position. At the end of the race I was faster than Jarno Trulli, but after the safety car period I had a problem getting the tyres up to temperature again.

"I think after a disappointing qualifying our race performance was good."