July 07, 2008
From Silverstone, England

LEWIS Hamilton delivered a masterful drive in wet conditions in front of a vociferous home crowd to win the British Grand Prix and reignite his world title challenge.

Persistent rain saw nearly all the drivers spin at some stage of the race, and though BMW's Nick Heidfeld produced a good drive to finish second and Rubens Barrichello was third, no one could come close to Hamilton who won his home race by a staggering 68.5 seconds.

An emotional Hamilton heralded his third win of the season and the seventh of his Formula One career as "by far'' his best ever.

"It was one of the toughest races I have ever done. I was thinking as I was driving, 'If I win this it will definitely go down as the best race I have ever done','' said Hamilton, who became the first Englishman to win at Silverstone since Johnny Herbert in 1995.

The British McLaren driver produced an excellent start and a superbly aggressive opening stint to take the lead early on, before going on to close the race out maturely.

"Coming into the last lap I could see the crowds standing up and I was just praying I would finish. You could not imagine the emotions that were going on inside me,'' he added.

The victory brings 23-year-old Hamilton his first points since winning at Monaco back in May and moves him up into a three-way tie at the top of the world championship.

Hamilton now shares top spot with the Ferraris of Kimi Raikkonen, who finished fourth at Silverstone, and Felipe Massa, who took no points from a nightmare race.

Heikki Kovalainen was fifth in the other McLaren, Fernando Alonso took sixth and Jarno Trulli and Kazuki Nakajima were the others to pick up points.

After solid rain throughout the morning, conditions brightened up somewhat for the race but a wet track and gusting winds still made for troublesome start conditions.

Hamilton made the best start of all, shooting around the outside to squeeze into second from fourth on the grid and briefly touching wheels with pole-sitter Kovalainen.

Mark Webber, his Red Bull starting from second, suffered an early spin and ended up right at the back of the field.

Kovalainen led his teammate and Raikkonen after the first lap but Hamilton immediately began to apply serious pressure on the leader, forcing him to defend desperately over the next four laps.

Such a sustained attack proved impossible to repel and Hamilton slipped past Kovalainen to take the lead on lap five.

As the home crowd cheered their hero, another Brit, David Coulthard, collided with Sebastien Vettel's Toro Rosso and both drivers ended up in the gravel and out of the race.

It was an unfortunate way for Coulthard to finish his final British Grand Prix - the Red Bull veteran having announced his retirement earlier this week.

Kovalainen slid into a spin on his tenth lap and allowed Raikkonen through into second where he would steadily cut the gap to Hamilton until the first round of pit stops.

On lap 21 of the 60 lap race Hamilton and Raikkonen entered the pits together with the Briton emerging, by a whisker, with his lead intact.

Raikkonen's pit crew controversially decided not to change tyres, a decision that saw the world champion lose significant time to the leader and also to those behind.

As Raikkonen's tyres continued to deteriorate he fell further and further off the pace and after finally cutting his losses and taking new tyres he had fallen to 11th place.

The rain began to fall solidly just after the halfway point of the race and Hamilton, Raikkonen and Renault's Nelson Piquet each aquaplaned off the track - the first two temporarily and Piquet for good.

As havoc reigned, BMW's Robert Kubica span off and out of the race and was soon joined by Jenson Button.

Honda's Barrichello was now fitted with the extreme wet tyres and lapping way faster than anyone else, he worked his way up into third place behind Hamilton and Heidfeld who had steadily manoeuvred into second.

The leader stopped for a second time on lap 37 but, with the rain beginning to clear, prudently not opted for extreme wet tyres.

With 10 laps to go, Hamilton had opened up a lead of over a minute and he went on to lap everyone behind third-placed Barrichello in a supreme display of dominance.

Raikkonen staged a late charge to take fourth while Heidfeld and Barrichello cruised to welcome podium finishes.

"I love the wet weather conditions,'' said Barrichello.

"It was a perfect race, everything went for me. It was just magic. I have this great feeling it is like I am young, I smile at the problems we encounter and just work harder.

"I just love the sport and love the speed, I cannot live without it.''

F1GP - British Grand PrixPos No Driver Team Time/Retired
1 22 Lewis Hamilton McLaren 1:39:09.440
2 3 Nick Heidfeld BMW Sauber +68.5 secs
3 17 Rubens Barrichello Honda +82.2 secs
4 1 Kimi Raikkonen Ferrari + 1 Lap
5 23 Heikki Kovalainen McLaren +1 Lap
6 5 Fernando Alonso Renault +1 Lap
7 11 Jarno Trulli Toyota +1 Lap
8 8 Kazuki Nakajima Williams +1 Lap
9 7 Nico Rosberg Williams +1 Lap
10 10 Mark Webber Red Bull +1 Lap
11 14 Sebastian Bourdais Toro Rosso +1 Lap
12 12 Timo Glock Toyota +1 Lap
13 2 Felipe Massa Ferrari +2 Laps
14 4 Robert Kubica BMW Sauber Retired
15 20 Adrian Sutil Force India Retired
16 21 Giancarlo Fisichella Force India Retired
17 9 David Coulthard Red Bull Retired
18 16 Jenson Button Honda Retired
19 6 Nelson Piquet Jr. Renault Retired
20 15 Sebastian Vettel Toro Rosso Retired


Grid but no points for Webber

From correspondents in Silverstone, England
July 07, 2008

AUSTRALIA'S Mark Webber suffered a disappointing, wet and ultimately pointless British Grand Prix after starting from an impressive second on the grid.

The New South Wales-born Red Bull driver had achieved the team's best qualifying result on Saturday but an opening lap spin dropped him to the back of the field.

He eventually finished 10th, way behind Britain's Lewis Hamilton who won his home race by over a minute.

"Unfortunately I dropped it on the entrance to Becketts corner on the first lap," Webber said.

"I was quite close to Kimi Raikkonen into the corner and just got on the white line. I lost the car on the exit and had to let the field go past, so it was clear to spin back round.

"After that it was about making the right call for the right conditions. It was a difficult day to go car racing and it just didn't go our way today.

"The guys did a good job all week and it's a shame we couldn't convert our good qualifying performance.''

Webber's Scottish teammate David Coulthard had an even worse day, the veteran causing a race-ending accident during the first lap of what would be his last British Grand Prix.

He said: "The visibility was incredibly bad as you can imagine. I'm extremely disappointed for this to happen at my last British Grand Prix.''

To make matters worse for Coulthard, who will retire at the end of the season, the other victim in the crash was German Sebastien Vettel of Red Bull's sister team Toro Rosso.

Coulthard said: "There was a clear gap down the inside, but unfortunately it was closing as I made the move.

"I'm sorry for Sebastian that we made contact and went into the gravel. I'm sorry for Red Bull too, as it was two cars out in one hit.''