Williams: Montoya's strategy quicker

"The simulation showed us that a two-stop race was eight to 10 seconds quicker, " explained chief operations engineer Sam Michael. "We made the decision to go that route for Juan Pablo because he was on the front row and we thought he would either lead or run behind Michael Schumacher, who we suspected would do a two-stop race.

"But when we looked at the warm-up times we thought that perhaps Ferrari was running with quite a lot of fuel and we couldn't guarantee that Ralf would be able to take advantage of a two-stop strategy from where he was, so we went for one," he added.

Schumacher Jr said: "It was a perfect race, the team did a fantastic job and the car was perfect, especially in the second stint when there was more rubber on the circuit. We were worried about the tyre wear and did have high wear with the first set. They were going off but the car was well balanced enough to take it."

In reality, Schumacher was fortunate not to be challenged. The first corner coming-together effectively ruled his brother and team-mate Montoya out of contention, and the second Ferrari of Rubens Barrichello suffered an engine failure, as did both McLarens.