THE seventh World Championship of Michael Schumacher’s career came not with the expected magical bang yesterday, but with rather more of a whimper as he accepted second best behind Kimi Räikkönen at the Belgian Grand Prix. Instead, the bangs were going on all around him as Formula One witnessed one of its most attritional and spectacular races of the season, while the whimpers came from drivers whose ambitions had ended in millions of shards of carbon fibre and yards of torn rubber.
This wonderful circuit is always the arena for exciting races, so it is no wonder that Schumacher adores its daunting contours. The race was supposed to be a formality for Schumacher: a seventh victory on the Spa track where he started his Formula One career in 1991 to crown a seventh championship in Ferrari’s 700th grand prix. But the champion’s pragmatic streak overwhelmed his instinct to put the icing on the cake and instilled a sense of caution as he accepted the inevitability of Räikkönen’s victory.
There were not two winners — Räikkönen and Schumacher — but three yesterday as Formula One proved that excitement and thrills are not lost. The dull display of Hungary a fortnight ago was forgotten. Hungary is a daft track the size of a Scalextric board that frustrates attempts to overtake; Spa is a sweeping circuit of high speeds and huge braking areas where drivers can explore the limits of their bravery and talent.
Unlike Hungary, we saw five different race leaders and a feast of overtaking, which helped to put a substantial hurdle between Schumacher and his desire for a victory that would provide a memor- able finale. That will now have to wait until Ferrari’s home grand prix at Monza in Italy in a fortnight, for yesterday belonged to Räikkönen and McLaren Mercedes.
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The team have not enjoyed victory since Räikkönen won in Malaysia 18 months ago and the struggle since has been embarrassing and expensive. They have produced three cars and found not one capable of winning until the MP4/19B made its debut in Britain in July.
Now, with the new car honed, McLaren are a force to be reckoned with. Räikkönen survived a bang at the first corner and an errant gearbox, as well as three safety car periods that cut his lead. After the safety car was called in for the final time three laps from the end, Räikkönen even punched in the fastest lap of the race to break Schumacher’s resolve, with Rubens Barrichello, the German’s team-mate, third.
“People probably wouldn’t believe I started from tenth and ended up first,” Räik- könen said. “I was really worried that the car was damaged after the first corner and then I was having trouble downshifting. I was pressing all the switches to see if I could correct things.”
Räikkönen was lucky that nothing was terminal, unlike the disasters that befell half the field. Four drivers — Giorgio Pantano, Gianmaria Bruni, Takuma Sato and Mark Webber — failed to complete one lap as they clattered into each other at the first-corner bunch-up. Jarno Trulli led from pole position before his car lost pace, while Fernando Alonso, his Renault team-mate, led briefly and then spun out spectacularly.
David Coulthard was on for his best finish of the year until he blew his right rear tyre, the first of three spectacular punctures that also claimed Juan Pablo Montoya and Jenson Button, who would both have been in the final mix had they finished. The young Englishman’s blow-out came at a frightening 200mph down the long Les Combes straight, the fastest part of the circuit, catapulting Button’s BAR Honda into the Minardi of the innocent Zsolt Baumgartner.
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“I was lucky I hit the Minardi, otherwise it could’ve been much worse,” he said. “It was a shock. Going backwards at that speed is a weird feeling.”
Antonio Pizzonia, BMW-Williams’s substitute driver, could have bagged a best-ever third place but for his car breaking down ten laps from home, while Coulthard overcame his delay to set off in pursuit of points and then smash into the rear of Christian Klien’s Jaguar with five laps to go. The Scot still took seventh place, while Klien took sixth, his best career performance.
It was a breathless conclusion to a thrilling race that marked an historic moment in Formula One. For a while, though, everyone could forget the crushing dominance of Michael Schumacher and Ferrari and just enjoy the quality of the racing. Even the seven-times world champion.
RECORD-BREAKER
Michael Schumacher’s records and the records that still elude him
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WORLD TITLES
7: SCHUMACHER
5: Juan Manuel Fangio
4: Alain Prost
RACE WINS
82: SCHUMACHER
51: Alain Prost
41: Ayrton Senna
POLE POSITIONS
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65: Ayrton Senna
62: SCHUMACHER
33: Jim Clark and Alain Prost
FASTEST LAPS
65: SCHUMACHER
41: Alain Prost
30: Nigel Mansell
WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP POINTS
1,166: SCHUMACHER
798.5: Alain Prost
614: Ayrton Senna
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GRANDS PRIX CONTESTED:
256: Ricardo Patrese
210: Gerhard Berger
209: SCHUMACHER