The Complete 2008 Hungarian GP Review

Until the race began, it looked like the Hungarian Grand Prix was going to be the next step in Lewis Hamilton's increasingly imperious stroll to the championship.

Then for nearly 70 laps, it appeared that Felipe Massa was going to revitalise Ferrari's title bid by pulling off a shock victory against all pre-race expectations.

But eventually, neither scenario prevailed. Instead Heikki Kovalainen benefited from a huge - but long overdue - slice of luck to take his maiden Formula One victory, ahead of the remarkable Timo Glock and the anonymous Kimi Raikkonen.

It was rather ironic that Kovalainen's first win should come on a day when he had under-performed compared to his early-season form. There was no doubt that the Finn had actually driven better in many prior races than he did in Hungary this weekend, but after all the cruel misfortunes (particularly in Spain, Turkey and Monaco) that had conspired to keep him off the podium for most of the early summer, this time fate decided to be kind to him. Given all that had gone before, Kovalainen wasn't going to let the fortunate events of the final laps tarnish his win.

"Regardless of circumstances in Formula One you don't have any style points; it's ten points, end of story," he said.

"There have been various incidents this year and we have been in the position quite a few times after Saturday to fight for the victory, but always something has gone wrong and it hasn't functioned perfectly. It all worked fine for me today and I am very, very happy about it.

"All the hard work that the whole team has put in the last few months, through difficult times, we just kept pushing and I am very, very glad to score my first victory."

On this afternoon of surprises, perhaps the biggest shock was not Massa's eleventh hour disaster, but the manner in which he had commanded the race before it was snatched from him.

His litany of errors in the rain at Silverstone, and the apparent docility of his capitulation to Hamilton in Germany, had naturally encouraged Massa's critics.

Yet there was nothing erratic or uncertain about the way he surged determinedly past the McLarens at the start of the Hungarian race. His move from third to first off the line was only partly due to a good getaway from a favourable grid position - the crucial element was the boldness with which he out-braked Hamilton, avoided running wide, and decisively claimed the corner, before pulling away if not with ease, then certainly without undue drama.

"When you have a problem and you are not in a good position, you still have the excuse to say, 'okay the position was not great anyway,'" said Massa. "But when you have a problem when you are first after a perfect race, one of your best, it is very frustrating."

But despite his inevitable disappointment, Massa said his Hungaroring performance had reinvigorated his season and proved that the destination of the title was far from a foregone conclusion - plus that post-qualifying pontificating is unwise...

"The confidence is there. After a race like that, even with the bad result at the end with two laps to go, what we did in the race still counts. We showed a great performance, a great pace and great teamwork. That is very good for the next races.

"We still need to push hard on developing the car, but also on the reliability. But I mean, in the worst case, we are still completely in the championship fight and we still have seven races until the end."

Practice

Practice one - Friday am

Ferrari's form in opening practice suggested that they were poised to overturn McLaren's recent superiority, as Felipe Massa led Kimi Raikkonen in a scarlet one-two ahead of Heikki Kovalainen and Lewis Hamilton.

However it was difficult to make firm predictions from a session that had taken nearly half its length to get going in earnest due to the notoriously dirty Hungaroring surface, as most teams chose to wait until the afternoon before trying for quick times.

Unsurprisingly, the morning therefore saw few incidents bar a quick spin for Jarno Trulli (Toyota), and Sebastian Vettel parking his Toro Rosso with a hydraulic failure.

Practice two - Friday pm

In second practice McLaren were back on top, with Hamilton leading the way for the majority of the afternoon and finishing up 0.4 seconds quicker than Massa's morning benchmark.

Kovalainen claimed third, as Renault's Nelson Piquet and Fernando Alonso grabbed impressive second and fourth places, leaving their team optimistic despite confessing that the times were achieved on relatively low fuel.

The Ferraris were only fifth and sixth, just 0.001 seconds apart, and with both drivers concerned that McLaren were a step ahead again.

Behind the BMWs and Trulli, Nico Rosberg was relieved to appear in 10th for Williams having languished near the tail of the pack in the morning, while his teammate Kazuki Nakajima also made similar gains before spinning and nudging the wall on his final run.

There was more bad luck for Vettel, who suffered a second hydraulic failure at almost the same part of the track and ended Friday with just nine laps under his belt.

Practice three - Saturday am

An uneventful final practice session saw Hamilton underline the strength of his pole challenge by lapping 0.339 seconds quicker than nearest rival Massa.

An impressive third went to Toyota's Timo Glock, who only received medical clearance to compete on the eve of the race weekend having been briefly hospitalised following his Hockenheim accident, but who had been amongst the front-runners for most of practice.

Kovalainen, Piquet and Nick Heidfeld (BMW) completed the top six, with the Toro Rosso duo showing eye-catching speed in seventh and eighth, as Vettel finally managed some mileage.

Qualifying

Part one

On Thursday BMW Sauber boss Mario Theissen had admitted that he couldn't be sure that Nick Heidfeld's qualifying problems were truly behind him until he notched up a run of successful Saturdays. Those comments looked prophetic in Q1 as Heidfeld struggled for speed on his first lap then hit traffic on his second run - leaving him a disastrous 16th on the grid.

Sebastien Bourdais would ultimately be penalised for impeding him, but that was little consolation to the German.

"I was hoping it was so obvious he would be penalised right away and I could still get into Q2," said Heidfeld.

He was joined back in the pits by row nine pair Kazuki Nakajima (Williams) and Rubens Barrichello (Honda) - the former struggling to achieve a balance, and the latter ruing a mistake at Turn 11.

The Force Indias brought up the rear, with Giancarlo Fisichella 0.7 seconds quicker than Adrian Sutil and both resigned to their positions as the four-race gearbox rules meant they could not yet use the seamless shift system tested in practice.

"I think we're not particularly quick round here and we have to accept that, but we are still quite close to the others," said Fisichella.

Part two

First to go in Q2 was Williams' Nico Rosberg, who never even had a chance to participate thanks to a hydraulic failure. He was adamant that a top ten slot had been possible.

"I made a mistake on my fast lap in Q1 and lost two and a half tenths in one corner, so my Q1 time did not show the true potential of our car," he said. "We had a good chance of making it into Q3."

Sebastian Vettel had got all his hydraulic gremlins out of the way on Friday, and despite being so short of practice mileage, he came within 0.013 seconds of breaking into the top ten - only being pushed back to 11th when Mark Webber and Nelson Piquet made late gains.

His teammate Bourdais was only 14th and unhappy with the option tyre, but his position was irrelevant in any case as he was soon to be penalised five places for delaying Heidfeld.

Also out were Jenson Button and David Coulthard, but while the latter was understandably underwhelmed by his 13th place, Button's 12th in the recalcitrant Honda was one of the achievements of the day.

"I got the most out of it for sure - there was nothing else left in the car," said the 2006 race winner.

Part three

Although Felipe Massa had set a record pace in Q2, when it mattered in Q3 only Lewis Hamilton ever looked like getting pole position.

His first Q3 flying lap put Hamilton 0.4 seconds clear of the rest of the field, and would have stood as pole even if he hadn't gone out again, as others closed in but all failed to beat it. He still completed a second run anyway, and improved again to claim his 10th Formula One pole position with a 1:20.899 lap.

To make Hamilton's day even better, he was at the head of McLaren's first front row sweep of 2008 - a particularly poignant result given that the Hungaroring was the scene of the infamous Fernando Alonso/Hamilton partnership meltdown twelve months earlier.

Heikki Kovalainen had only been ninth after his first run, but made massive gains at the end of the session to vault to second place, 0.141 seconds slower than Hamilton.

The Finn's improvement pushed Felipe Massa back to third - which was still significantly better than his teammate Kimi Raikkonen managed, as the still out-of-sorts world champion languished in sixth.

"I would say it was my fault really. I went off on the last lap, and I don't know how much I lost but it certainly didn't help. My first lap also was not very nice," he said. "The car wasn't too bad today but I couldn't get any real laps - it didn't really come together."

Robert Kubica put his BMW fourth alongside Massa, and admitted that it was far better than he had expected after a hitherto muted weekend for the team.

"This was certainly one of my best qualifying sessions so far this season," he said. "I was not expecting to start from fourth as the car has been quite difficult to drive over the entire weekend."

But the Pole's delight was nothing compared to Timo Glock's satisfaction at earning a career-best fifth just two weeks after his violent Hockenheim crash.

"We are in a great situation for tomorrow," he said. "It's good for all of us and after Hockenheim this is the perfect answer."

His teammate Jarno Trulli, normally Toyota's qualifying talisman, wasn't so upbeat though, having struggled for grip and balance on the way to a comparatively low-key ninth, behind row four pair Fernando Alonso and Mark Webber, with Piquet completing the top ten.

Qualifying results

Pos  Driver        Team                 Q1        Q2        Q3      Laps
 1.  Hamilton      McLaren-Mercedes     1:19.376  1:19.473  1:20.899  12
 2.  Kovalainen    McLaren-Mercedes     1:19.945  1:19.480  1:21.140  16
 3.  Massa         Ferrari              1:19.578  1:19.068  1:21.191  16
 4.  Kubica        BMW Sauber           1:20.053  1:19.776  1:21.281  19
 5.  Glock         Toyota               1:19.980  1:19.246  1:21.326  24
 6.  Raikkonen     Ferrari              1:20.006  1:19.546  1:21.516  19
 7.  Alonso        Renault              1:20.229  1:19.816  1:21.698  15
 8.  Webber        Red Bull-Renault     1:20.073  1:20.046  1:21.732  18
 9.  Trulli        Toyota               1:19.942  1:19.486  1:21.767  20
10.  Piquet        Renault              1:20.583  1:20.131  1:22.371  19
11.  Vettel        Toro Rosso-Ferrari   1:20.157  1:20.144            17
12.  Button        Honda                1:20.888  1:20.332            15
13.  Coulthard     Red Bull-Renault     1:20.505  1:20.502            16
14.  Bourdais      Toro Rosso-Ferrari   1:20.640  1:20.963            16
15.  Rosberg       Williams-Toyota      1:20.748                      10
16.  Heidfeld      BMW Sauber           1:21.045                       7
17.  Nakajima      Williams-Toyota      1:21.085                       9
18.  Barrichello   Honda                1:21.332                       8
19.  Fisichella    Force India-Ferrari  1:21.670                       9
20.  Sutil         Force India-Ferrari  1:22.113                      10

The Race

Given both practice and qualifying form, and the events of preceding races, it looked like the 2008 Hungarian Grand Prix would be a crushing and probably uneventful McLaren walkover.

Felipe Massa had other ideas, though, and had no intention of settling in behind the silver cars. Making the most of the grip advantage offered by the 'odd' side of the grid, the Ferrari driver blasted past second-place starter Heikki Kovalainen as soon as the lights went out, then closed in on pole-sitter Lewis Hamilton.

He tucked into the McLaren's slipstream, then jinked to the outside approaching Turn 1, locked up both front wheels as he desperately tried to slow for the corner, but managed to keep his car under control and turn in as the race leader.

"The start was the only place where we could have passed Lewis and had the opportunity to win the race, so that is why I took a lot of risk," said Massa. "But it worked."

Even with Massa ahead, the suspicion was that Hamilton would soon be all over him, or that it would only be a matter of waiting until the McLaren ran further at the pit stops and calmly leapfrogged into the lead.

But after an initial burst of pressure from Hamilton, Massa began to creep away in the lead, and by the time he became the first pit visit on lap 18, the Brazilian was a useful 3.5 seconds ahead.

Sure enough, Hamilton had been running heavier - but only one more lap passed before he too stopped for fuel, and rather than bringing him closer to the Ferrari, the strategy temporarily increased the gap as the two leaders emerged either side of the battling Fernando Alonso and Kimi Raikkonen, allowing Massa to get further away.

By this time, the top two had left the rest of the field in their wake. Kovalainen held a solitary third on a slightly heavier fuel load, but was 10 seconds behind Massa by the stops, and only three seconds clear of the vastly impressive Timo Glock - who confounded expectations of Toyota showboating by staying out until lap 20.

Glock had passed Robert Kubica off the line, and as the Pole tried to prevent Raikkonen from doing likewise, Alonso managed to sneak around the outside and get between the BMW and the Ferrari, with all three quickly falling away from the flying Glock.

By the time the significant first stops were complete, Massa remained 2.7 seconds clear of Hamilton, and had little trouble stretching that gap. Kovalainen had managed to put a little more daylight between himself and Glock during the pit sequence, but the Toyota still lurked within seven seconds of the McLaren.

Alonso and Raikkonen had pitted in unison on lap 22, Renault managed to keep their man behind of the Ferrari, with Nelson Piquet now close behind this battle after gaining ground by running until lap 25 before his first stop.

The Brazilian had earlier lost a place to Jarno Trulli during a busy first lap, but his longer opening stint allowed Piquet to get ahead of the Toyota, as this whole group jumped ahead of Kubica when the BMW lost track position by pitting relatively early, then lacked the pace to get back in contention.

"We were very slow and I was struggling with the overall grip of the car," Kubica explained. "I had massive oversteer and could not really push. I was trying hard to keep the car on the track."

His team boss Mario Theissen reckoned there was nothing more Kubica - who was being cheered on by hordes of Polish fans - could have done.

"We were completely off the pace," Theissen admitted.

After qualifying Kubica might have expected to be challenging his second row partner Massa for the final podium spot, but instead the BMW was tumbling right out of the points while the Ferrari was beginning to take control of the race - pulling out a five-second lead over Hamilton again.

"We showed incredible pace afterwards. I even managed to open the gap," said Massa, who was confident he had enough in hand whatever McLaren's strategists had in store.

That all became academic anyway on lap 41 when Hamilton suddenly slewed off the track at Turn 5, his left front tyre having deflated.

Bridgestone's initial suspicion was that debris, rather than Hamilton's famously tyre-punishing driving style - had been to blame, but whatever the cause, the Briton lost 65 seconds and eight positions as he nursed the car back to the pits and made an early final stop.

Hamilton's misfortune also made Massa's life rather easier. Now 23 seconds clear of Kovalainen, all he had to do was cruise through the remaining 29 laps to collect a surprise victory and put himself back in the championship lead.

But this race had one more shock twist in store. Although he allowed his lead to dwindle to just five seconds, Massa was clearly in complete control until his Ferrari engine suddenly detonated on the pits straight as he began the 67th lap.

"We did a perfect job today and then we just gave it away," said the devastated Brazilian. "I feel very bad but unfortunately this is part of our sport."

So, on occasion, is extremely good fortune - as the hitherto luckless Kovalainen found out when he swept past the stranded Ferrari and collected an unexpected first Grand Prix victory. It hadn't been the finest performance of his season, but that wasn't going to stop him celebrating, especially given how often luck had been against him earlier in the year.

"Today obviously I knew Massa and Lewis were both very fast at the beginning but halfway through the race I felt it was starting to work for me a little bit better," said Kovalainen.

"Then at the end I just tried to put pressure on Massa and hoped something would happen and obviously it looked like he had a mechanical failure, so it all worked fine for me today and I am very, very happy about it."

However it was second-placed Glock who celebrated most ecstatically in parc ferme. The German had remained within a respectable distance of Kovalainen all afternoon, then remained calm even as Raikkonen charged towards him in the final stint - the Finn having finally got ahead of Alonso at the final stops.

"It's unbelievable," Glock exclaimed. "I am in my first year with just half of the season over and I am on the podium. It is just a perfect weekend."

Raikkonen looked like he would be all over the Toyota in the final laps until a late error saw him drop back a little. He was reasonably satisfied with the points for third (which keep him in the three-way title battle with Hamilton and Massa), but admitted that his current poor qualifying form was destroying his race chances.

"We have the speed in the race but if I can't get the qualifying right we are going to end up in the same situation every race, so we need to sort it out," said Raikkonen. "If we can be in the front, then we can fight for wins but in this position when we are just following people, then we cannot use the speed."

After so many missed opportunities in recent months, fourth was a satisfying result for Alonso, who managed to hold off the closing Hamilton in the final laps as the McLaren gained ground when others made their last stops.

"We fought hard today and we were on the pace with a car that was working well, which is encouraging for the rest of the championship," Alonso said. "We scored some important points which is satisfying, even though we could have maybe been on the podium."

To complete a pleasing day for Renault, Piquet won his race-long battle with Trulli by 4.4 seconds and claimed sixth after arguably a more impressive drive than his Hockenheim podium. Both were comfortably clear of the highly disappointed Kubica.

A quiet weekend for Red Bull ended with ninth and 11th places for Mark Webber and David Coulthard, who were split by Nick Heidfeld's BMW. The latter's one-stop strategy allowed him to improve on his poor qualifying result, but he had hoped for better.

Jenson Button converted his 12th on the grid to the same position at the chequered flag, despite losing several places with a start so bad that his teammate Rubens Barrichello - who had qualified five places lower down - managed to pass him.

However after a spirited early battle, Button had the pace to pull away, while Barrichello became one of a trio of drivers whose races were spoilt by brief fires at their pitstops.

Kazuki Nakajima and Sebastien Bourdais were the others to encounter the problem, which saw small amounts of fuel leak as the nozzles were withdrawn, causing flash fires on the cars' sides.

The number of fires in quick succession raised eyebrows, but Honda's Nick Fry reckoned it was simple coincidence - admitting that his crew had not lined the nozzle up correctly.

Bourdais was worst affected, suffering the problem at both stops and then having to pit again to have extinguisher foam cleaned from his visor. He finished last, with Barrichello 16th behind Nakajima, Nico Rosberg and Giancarlo Fisichella.

The latter trio had a race-long dice that included brief contact between Nakajima and Fisichella as the Force India dived past. Ultimately Fisichella fell behind both Williams in the final stops, while Nakajima emerged in front of Rosberg as his brief fuel fire was less time-consuming than the more prosaic fuel rig problems that the German had at his first stop.

The deeply unlucky Massa had completed enough distance to be classified 17th, with Sebastian Vettel and Adrian Sutil the only retirements - the latter due to an overheating engine after a lengthy pitstop, and Sutil after an afternoon of brake problems.

Race results

70 laps; 306.663km;
Weather: Sunny.

Classified:

Pos  Driver        Team                      Time
 1.  Kovalainen    McLaren-Mercedes      (B)  1h37:27.067
 2.  Glock         Toyota                (B)  +    11.061
 3.  Raikkonen     Ferrari               (B)  +    16.856
 4.  Alonso        Renault               (B)  +    21.614
 5.  Hamilton      McLaren-Mercedes      (B)  +    23.048
 6.  Piquet        Renault               (B)  +    32.298
 7.  Trulli        Toyota                (B)  +    36.449
 8.  Kubica        BMW Sauber            (B)  +    48.321
 9.  Webber        Red Bull-Renault      (B)  +    58.834
10.  Heidfeld      BMW Sauber            (B)  +  1:07.709
11.  Coulthard     Red Bull-Renault      (B)  +  1:10.407
12.  Button        Honda                 (B)  +     1 lap
13.  Nakajima      Williams-Toyota       (B)  +     1 lap
14.  Rosberg       Williams-Toyota       (B)  +     1 lap
15.  Fisichella    Force India-Ferrari   (B)  +     1 lap
16.  Barrichello   Honda                 (B)  +    2 laps
17.  Bourdais      Toro Rosso-Ferrari    (B)  +    3 laps
18.  Massa         Ferrari               (B)  +    3 laps

Fastest lap: Raikkonen, 1:21.195

Not classified/retirements:

Driver        Team                      On lap
Sutil         Force India-Ferrari   (B)    63
Vettel        Toro Rosso-Ferrari    (B)    23


World Championship standings, round 11:

Drivers:                    Constructors:             
 1.  Hamilton      62        1.  Ferrari               111
 2.  Raikkonen     57        2.  McLaren-Mercedes      100
 3.  Massa         54        3.  BMW Sauber             90
 4.  Kubica        49        4.  Toyota                 35
 5.  Heidfeld      41        5.  Renault                31
 6.  Kovalainen    38        6.  Red Bull-Renault       24
 7.  Trulli        22        7.  Williams-Toyota        16
 8.  Alonso        18        8.  Honda                  14
 9.  Webber        18        9.  Toro Rosso-Ferrari      8
10.  Glock         13
11.  Piquet        13
12.  Barrichello   11
13.  Rosberg        8
14.  Nakajima       8
15.  Vettel         6
16.  Coulthard      6
17.  Button         3
18.  Bourdais       2

Team-by-Team

FERRARI

By Friday afternoon Ferrari already fear they are set to trail McLaren again, and sure enough the silver cars sweep the front row ahead of Massa, with Raikkonen off the pace in sixth.

Yet a superb start and a brave first corner move put Massa in the lead, and he manages to pull away before being robbed of a certain victory (and a return to the head of the championship standings) when his engine fails with just three laps to go.

That retirement, and Hamilton's puncture, help Raikkonen come through to third after a quiet race mostly spent bottled up behind Alonso, who overtook him at the first corner. He finally passes the Renault at the last stops and pulls away.

Kubica's fourth on the grid proves to be misleading, the Pole's excellent qualifying lap masking his car's lack of race pace. A relatively early stop drops him behind most of the cars he raced against initially, and only Massa's failure allows him to inherit a point.

Heidfeld has another qualifying disaster and starts 15th after Bourdais is penalised for blocking him. He uses a one-stop strategy to progress to 10th, and is also concerned about BMW's race pace.

Second and fourth places in Friday practice augur well, and the Renaults then use comparatively heavy fuel loads to qualify seventh (Alonso) and 10th (Piquet).

Alonso passes Raikkonen at the start and manages to hold him off until the final stops. He passes Kubica in the pits and moves up to finish fourth as others hit trouble.

Piquet runs even further in his first stint and shows very strong pace as he battles with Trulli not far behind his team leader. Finishes a creditable sixth.

Rosberg is optimistic that Williams are set to return to form after practice, only for a hydraulic failure in qualifying to strand him in 15th on the grid after Bourdais' penalty.

A fuel rig problem mars his race and he can only finish 14th, behind Nakajima, who qualifies a disappointing 17th, then survives a brief fuel fire and a brush with Fisichella to take 13th.

After recent gains, Red Bull have a very quiet weekend in Hungary, with no particular problems aside from a general lack of performance.

Webber and Coulthard qualify eighth and 13th respectively, and finish ninth and 11th after thoroughly underwhelming races.

Glock makes an astonishing return after his Hockenheim crash, setting fast times throughout practice then qualifying a career-best fifth on a perfectly respectable fuel load.

He runs close behind Kovalainen all race, and as others suffer their misfortunes, Glock finds himself in second place, fending off Raikkonen for a spectacular and thoroughly unexpected runner-up finish.

By contrast Trulli has a very low-key time, starting ninth and finishing behind Piquet in seventh having lost out to the Renault at their first stops after earlier overtaking it during a first lap dice.

Two hydraulic failures mean Vettel completes just nine laps on Friday, yet he is eighth in final practice and only just misses out on a top ten start. An overheating engine ends his race early, though.

Bourdais is also fast on Saturday morning, then struggles in qualifying again and takes 14th before being penalised five places for delaying Heidfeld. Two fuel spillages and consequent minor fires, plus an extra stop to clean extinguisher foam from his visor, leave him 18th and last.

Button qualifies an impressive 12th and recovers from a bad start to finish in the same position, having put a brave pass on fast-starting teammate Barrichello (who only qualified 18th) early on.

Barrichello also loses time with a fuel fire and comes home 16th.

The seamless shift gearbox is tested in practice but the team decide not to risk a gearbox penalty for an unscheduled change so choose to wait until Valencia for the system's race debut.

Fisichella and Sutil are slowest in qualifying again but the former has a 0.7 second advantage and drives a strong race, battling with the Williams throughout before taking 15th. Sutil struggles with brake problems all afternoon and eventually retires when the combination of these issues and a puncture proves insurmountable.

Hamilton and Kovalainen dominate qualifying and take the team's first front row sweep of the year. The scene seems set for an easy one-two in the race, but Massa stuns the McLaren duo by passing them both by the first corner and then edging away.

Hamilton remains in contention in second and hopes to jump the Ferrari at the final stops, but never gets the chance to try as he suffers a left-front puncture and drops to 10th, eventually recovering to fifth as others pit.

Kovalainen runs a distant third, then moves up to second after Hamilton's puncture. He closes rapidly on the cruising Massa as his car improves later in the race, then emerges with a shock victory when the Ferrari's engine fails.

Lap-by-Lap

Lap 1: On pole position for the 10th time in his Formula One career, Lewis Hamilton leads initially but Felipe Massa, starting from third on the grid, sweeps around the outside to take the lead at Turn One.

Kimi Raikkonen ran most of the race behind Fernando Alonso © LAT

Heikki Kovalainen lies third from Timo Glock, Robert Kubica, Fernando Alonso, Kimi Raikkonen, Mark Webber, Jarno Trulli, Nelson Piquet (passed by Trulli during the lap), David Coulthard (who runs wide at Turn Two), Nick Heidfeld, Rubens Barrichello, Jenson Button, Sebastian Vettel, Sebastien Bourdais, Nico Rosberg, Kazuki Nakajima, Giancarlo Fisichella and Adrian Sutil.

Massa leads by 1.3 seconds.

Lap 2: Hamilton reduces his arrears to 0.9 seconds.

Lap 3: Hamilton laps in 1:22.617 to recover another tenth. Button passes Barrichello. Vettel runs wide at Turn 14.

Lap 4: Massa laps in 1:22.399 and leads by 1.1 seconds.

Lap 6: Massa leads by 1.7 seconds. Vettel runs wide at Turn 11.

Lap 7: Massa posts a 1:22.059 and extends his advantage to 1.9 seconds.

Lap 10: Massa sets a new best - 1:21.860 - to lead Hamilton by 2.8 seconds and Kovalainen by 7.8 seconds.

Lap 12: Massa improves again, to 1:21.479. Hamilton laps in 1:21.606 - a personal best.

Lap 15: Massa laps in 1:21.414, Hamilton in 1:21.493. The gap is 3.0 seconds.

Lap 16: Massa continues to up his pace: 1:21.355.

Lap 18: Massa pits and rejoins fourth, ahead of Alonso. Kubica and Webber refuel, too.

Lap 19: Hamilton pits and slips to sixth.

Heikki Kovalainen holds position ahead of Timo Glock © LAT

Lap 20: Kovalainen leads. Glock and Vettel pit.

Lap 21: Kovalainen pits. Massa leads again.

Lap 22: Alonso and Raikkonen pit. Alonso rejoins just ahead of the Finn.

Lap 24: Massa leads by 3.1 seconds from Hamilton. Trulli pits - as does the now lapped Vettel. The Toro Rosso is pushed into its garage.

Lap 26: Piquet pits from his third place. He rejoins eighth, behind Raikkonen.

Lap 29: Coulthard and Fisichella pit. The Scot rejoins just ahead of Barrichello.

Lap 30: Rosberg and Sutil pit.

Lap 31: Button and Bourdais pit. Bourdais suffers a quick flash-fire that is rapidly extinguished.

Lap 32: Barrichello and Nakajima pit. Barrichello also has a quick flash-fire.

Lap 35: Half-distance. Massa leads Hamilton by 4.0 seconds. Kovalainen, Glock, Alonso, Raikkonen, Piquet and Trulli run third to eighth.

Lap 41: Hamilton runs wide at Turn Five, slows down and pits. He has a punctured front left tyre. He rejoins 10th. Heidfeld makes his first stop.

Lap 44: Massa, leading by 23.6 seconds, pits. He rejoins second, between Kovalainen and Glock.

Lap 45: Sutil and Bourdais pit.

Lap 46: Bourdais pits again.

Nelsinho Piquet forces Jarno Trulli wide © LAT

Lap 47: Glock and Webber pit.

Lap 48: Kovalainen pits. Massa leads again.

Lap 50: Raikkonen runs wide at Turn Two. Alonso and Kubica pit. Fisichella and Rosberg pass Nakajima.

Lap 51: Raikkonen pits.

Lap 52: Massa leads Kovalainen by 15.4 seconds. Button pits.

Lap 53: Trulli and Coulthard pit, as does Barrichello.

Lap 54: Kovalainen reduces his arrears to 14.4 seconds. Piquet pits and rejoins alongside Trulli. The Brazilian wins their battle through Turn One.

Lap 55: Fisichella pits.

Lap 56: Massa leads by 12.6 seconds.

Lap 58: Rosberg pits.

Lap 59: Glock runs wide at Turn Four. Raikkonen sets fastest lap: 1:21.267.

Lap 60: Kovalainen trails by 9.8 seconds. Sutil pits. He rejoins for a couple of laps and then pulls in to retire.

Lap 61: Raikkonen laps in 1:21.195. He trails Glock by 4.2 seconds.

Timo Glock, Heikki Kovalainen, and Kimi Raikkonen on the podium © LAT

Lap 65: Massa leads by 7.2 seconds. Glock is only 0.8 seconds ahead of Raikkonen.

Lap 68: Massa's engine blows just after he crosses the start/finish line. Kovalainen leads.

Lap 70: Kovalainen scores his maiden F1 win, 11.0 seconds clear of Glock. Raikkonen is third from Alonso, Hamilton, Piquet, Trulli and Kubica.