2008 British Grand Prix
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  2008 British Grand Prix

Race details
Race 9 of 18 in the 2008 Formula One season.
The Silverstone Circuit modified in 2000
Date	July 6 2008
Official name	LXI Santander British Grand Prix
Location	Silverstone Circuit, Silverstone, Northamptonshire and Buckinghamshire, England
Course	Permanent Road Facility 5.141 km (3.194 mi)
Distance	60 laps, 308.355 km (191.603 mi)
Weather	Overcast, rain and sunny; Air 16-18°C, Track 15-23°C
Pole position
Driver	Heikki Kovalainen	McLaren-Mercedes
Time	1:21.049
Fastest lap
Driver	Kimi Räikkönen	Ferrari
Time	1:32.150 on lap 18
Podium
First	Lewis Hamilton	McLaren-Mercedes
Second	Nick Heidfeld	BMW Sauber
Third	Rubens Barrichello	Honda

The 2008 British Grand Prix (formally the LXI Santander British Grand Prix) was a Formula One motor race held on July 6, 2008 at the Silverstone Circuit, Silverstone, England. It was the 9th race of the 2008 Formula One season. The race, contested over 60 laps, was won by Lewis Hamilton for the McLaren team after starting from second position. Nick Heidfeld finished second in a BMW Sauber car, with Rubens Barrichello third in a Honda. Heikki Kovalainen, who started from pole position, finished the race in fifth place.¹

Report

Practice

Despite suffering a crash in the latter part of the session, Ferrari's Felipe Massa was fastest in Friday's morning practice. The Brazilian driver met with an accident due to oil spilled from Fernando Alonso's Renault.² McLaren's Heikki Kovalainen and Lewis Hamilton were second and third fastest in the session. Kovalainen however was fastest in Friday's second practice session, ahead of Red Bull's Mark Webber with Hamilton once again running third. Jarno Trulli in Toyota suffered a crash in this session while Williams' Kazuki Nakajima hit a sidewall.³ Alonso was fastest in damp conditions during final practice session on Saturday, with Webber and Kovalainen second and third respectively. David Coulthard of Red Bull did not participate through most of the session due to a technical problem with his car and was ranked at the end of the order.⁴

Qualifying

Heikki Kovalainen took the first pole position of his career for McLaren.

First session

McLaren's Heikki Kovalainen was quickest in the first session, comfortably ahead of the rest of the field. His teammate Lewis Hamilton was second, over three tenths behind, and less than a tenth ahead of Toro Rosso's Sebastian Vettel as well as Ferrari's Kimi Räikkönen. BMW Sauber's Robert Kubica was fifth and Sébastien Bourdais was sixth.

Nico Rosberg in the Williams could only run a single lap after facing a suspension problem and was eliminated in the session. Other drivers eliminated were Honda's Rubens Barrichello and Jenson Button and Force India's Adrian Sutil and Giancarlo Fisichella.

Second session

The two McLarens were again dominant in the second session, with Hamilton edging Kovalainen by six hundredths of a second. Red Bull's Mark Webber was only just over a tenth behind Kovalainen in third. The BMW Sauber cars of Kubica and Nick Heidfeld were less than a tenth behind him. The first of the Ferraris was that of Räikkönen in sixth place.

David Coulthard in the second Red Bull faced problems due to engine oil leak during qualifying and was eliminated in this session,⁵ along with the Glock, Bourdais, Trulli and Nakajima.

Third session

Kovalainen took his first career pole position by over half a second ahead of Mark Webber, whose Red Bull found an extra bit of pace to take second ahead of Räikkönen and Hamilton. The first of the BMW Saubers was that of Nick Heidfeld in fifth place with the Renaults of Fernando Alonso and Nelson Piquet in sixth and seventh places, Vettel qualifying eighth. Felipe Massa could go for a second lap run since his pitcrew faced a problem while changing the right rear tire during his pitstop after the first run.⁶ He had to settle for ninth place. Kubica did not set the time in the third session after he abandoned his first lap due to a possible puncture.

Race

Heikki Kovalainen leads McLaren team-mate Lewis Hamilton in the early laps.

Like the Monaco Grand Prix earlier in the year, the race was held in semi-wet conditions, with all drivers opting for the intermediate tyres. Rosberg had his Williams car radically changed to the wet setup, thus forfeiting his grid position to start from the pitlane instead.

At the start Kovalainen got away well from his pole position. Webber, who was second in his Red Bull, had to move left to block a charging Räikkönen, giving Lewis Hamilton a chance to seize second position. The McLaren cars entered the first corner side by side, while Räikkönen's Ferrari overtook Webber for third. Sebastian Vettel had the worst start and lost his position to Massa and Kubica. Meeting more trouble, Webber spun his car just after Maggotts corner before the Hangar Straight, dropping him to the back of the field just in front of Nico Rosberg. His spin was the first of many in this race, as Felipe Massa also spun at the second sector of the lap and fell to the back. Consequently, all the midfielders bunched up together, and David Coulthard and Vettel collided past Bridge Corner, both retiring.

Nick Heidfeld (back) overtaking Fernando Alonso during the middle phase of the race.

On lap 3 Fernando Alonso rapidly caught and passed Heidfeld's BMW, and Massa spun again, falling to last place. On lap 5, Hamilton passed Kovalainen into Stowe Corner, with Alonso rapidly closing on Räikkönen in third. Webber passed five cars in five laps as he moved back up through the field, and Sutil aquaplaned off the track into the gravel trap on lap 10 and retired.

From lap 18 most drivers started coming into the pits for fuel and tyres. Believing that the rain would not return, the Ferrari and Renault drivers decided to keep the worn tyres on, which offer an advantage over new intermediates on a drier track. McLaren, BMW and several other teams swapped for another set of intermediate tyres.

Heidfeld passing Kovalainen on his way to second position.

On lap 22 there was a downpour on the track. Räikkönen, who had closed right up on Hamilton before their pitstops, rapidly dropped back, while the Englishman on fresh intermediates pulled away at the head of the field at a rate sometimes several seconds a lap faster than any driver on the same tyres. Most teams elected not to lose time in the pits switching again to the full wet tyres designed for these conditions. Those teams that opted for full wets, however, obtained a significant advantage, as evidenced by Rubens Barrichello who moved from 15th to second place, and had been lapping up to 30 seconds faster than the lap leader. However, when Barrichello pitted there was a problem with the fuelling rig and Jenson Button queued up behind him. The problem meant that not enough fuel was put into the car, and Barrichello later had to pit again, dropping him to third place behind Heidfeld, who had passed Alonso, Räikkönen and Kovalainen to move into second.

Throughout the middle part of the race the rain continued and several drivers left the track, sliding across the grass, including the leader Hamilton. Piquet, Button and Kubica all spun into retirement during this period, and there were less serious spins for Räikkönen, Massa and Glock. Rosberg hit Glock on lap 40 and had to pit for a new front wing. As the rain eased and the track started to dry out a little, the lap times improved, but the track was never dry enough to allow the use of dry tyres. Despite this, Hamilton was able to start a late charge and put himself a considerable distance ahead of his pursuers. Kovalainen, suffering from understeer, spun on lap 49 but recovered and later passed Alonso for 5th place. Trulli passed Nakajima for 7th place on the last lap.

Hamilton crossed the finish line first, having lapped all but BMW's Heidfeld and Honda's Barrichello, who completed the final podium positions, both trailing Hamilton by over a minute. The Briton later described his race as "one of the best ones I have ever driven."⁷ 13 drivers were classified, the last being Felipe Massa after spinning six times during the course of the race. The Brazilian said afterwards, "I could hardly keep the car in a straight line."⁸

Classification

Qualifying

Pos	No	Name	Constructor	Part 1	Part 2	Part 3	Grid
1	23	Heikki Kovalainen	McLaren-Mercedes	1:19.957	1:19.597	1:21.049	1
2	10	Mark Webber	Red Bull-Renault	1:20.982	1:19.710	1:21.554	2
3	1	Kimi Räikkönen	Ferrari	1:20.370	1:19.971	1:21.706	3
4	22	Lewis Hamilton	McLaren-Mercedes	1:20.288	1:19.537	1:21.835	4
5	3	Nick Heidfeld	BMW Sauber	1:21.022	1:19.802	1:21.873	5
6	5	Fernando Alonso	Renault	1:20.998	1:19.992	1:22.029	6
7	6	Nelson Piquet Jr.	Renault	1:20.818	1:20.115	1:22.491	7
8	15	Sebastian Vettel	Toro Rosso-Ferrari	1:20.318	1:20.109	1:23.251	8
9	2	Felipe Massa	Ferrari	1:20.676	1:20.086	1:23.305	9
10	4	Robert Kubica	BMW Sauber	1:20.444	1:19.788	no time	10
11	9	David Coulthard	Red Bull-Renault	1:21.224	1:20.174		11
12	12	Timo Glock	Toyota	1:20.893	1:20.274		12
13	14	Sébastien Bourdais	Toro Rosso-Ferrari	1:20.584	1:20.531		13
14	11	Jarno Trulli	Toyota	1:21.145	1:20.601		14
15	8	Kazuki Nakajima	Williams-Toyota	1:21.407	1:21.112		15
16	17	Rubens Barrichello	Honda	1:21.512			16
17	16	Jenson Button	Honda	1:21.631			17
18	7	Nico Rosberg	Williams-Toyota	1:21.668			20
19	20	Adrian Sutil	Force India-Ferrari	1:21.786			18
20	21	Giancarlo Fisichella	Force India-Ferrari	1:21.885			19

Race

Lewis Hamilton won the race by over a minute from second-place Nick Heidfeld.

Rubens Barrichello took Honda's first podium finish since 2006.

Pos	No	Driver	Constructor	Laps	Time/Retired	Grid	Points
1	22	Lewis Hamilton	McLaren-Mercedes	60	1:39:09.440	4	10
2	3	Nick Heidfeld	BMW Sauber	60	+1:08.577	5	8
3	17	Rubens Barrichello	Honda	60	+1:22.273	16	6
4	1	Kimi Räikkönen	Ferrari	59	+1 Lap	3	5
5	23	Heikki Kovalainen	McLaren-Mercedes	59	+1 Lap	1	4
6	5	Fernando Alonso	Renault	59	+1 Lap	6	3
7	11	Jarno Trulli	Toyota	59	+1 Lap	14	2
8	8	Kazuki Nakajima	Williams-Toyota	59	+1 Lap	15	1
9	7	Nico Rosberg	Williams-Toyota	59	+1 Lap	20
10	10	Mark Webber	Red Bull-Renault	59	+1 Lap	2
11	14	Sébastien Bourdais	Toro Rosso-Ferrari	59	+1 Lap	13
12	12	Timo Glock	Toyota	59	+1 Lap	12
13	2	Felipe Massa	Ferrari	58	+2 Laps	9
Ret	4	Robert Kubica	BMW Sauber	39	Spin	10
Ret	16	Jenson Button	Honda	38	Spun off	17
Ret	6	Nelson Piquet Jr.	Renault	35	Spin	7
Ret	21	Giancarlo Fisichella	Force India-Ferrari	16	Spin	19
Ret	20	Adrian Sutil	Force India-Ferrari	10	Spin	18
Ret	15	Sebastian Vettel	Toro Rosso-Ferrari	0	Collision	8
Ret	9	David Coulthard	Red Bull-Renault	0	Collision	11

Notes

• Lap Leaders: Heikki Kovalainen 4 (1-4), Lewis Hamilton 55 (5-21, 23-60), Nick Heidfeld 1 (22)
• First Pole Position: Heikki Kovalainen
• First front row start: Red Bull Racing
• Kimi Räikkönen set the fastest lap for the sixth consecutive race, his longest ever streak and placing him just one behind Alberto Ascari's record of 7 (between the 1952 Belgian Grand Prix and the 1953 Argentine Grand Prix). Finland also equalled Italy's record of 7 consecutive fastest laps by drivers from the same country, as Heikki Kovalainen had set the fastest lap in the Bahrain Grand Prix immediately preceding Räikkönen's streak.
• Hamilton's win was the first time in 8 years a British driver had won at the British Grand Prix. David Coulthard, with McLaren, won in 2000.
• This was David Coulthard's last British GP after announcing his retirement, unfortunately failing to complete a lap during his final home Grand Prix.
• Rubens Barrichello's first podium since 2005 United States Grand Prix and Honda Racing F1's first podium since 2006 Brazilian Grand Prix.
• This was the first time that the British Grand Prix was held in rainy conditions since 2002.
• Lewis Hamilton's winning margin was the largest since Damon Hill won by over two laps in the 1995 Australian Grand Prix.
• Kazuki Nakajima's eighth place was the first point for Williams at Silverstone since Juan-Pablo Montoya (who is still the last winner for Williams), finished 5th at the 2004 British Grand Prix.
• For the United States TV coverage, FOX broadcasted this race.

References

External links

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2008 British Grand Prix

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Lewis Hamilton wins 2008 British Grand Prix

• Official FIA results