The Hindu : Sport : It's victory No. 5 for Kimi Raikkonen

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Monday, Aug 22, 2005

Sport

Sport

It's victory No. 5 for Kimi Raikkonen

ISTANBUL: : Kimi Raikkonen of McLaren-Mercedes won the inaugural Turkish Grand Prix from the pole on Sunday, increasing the pressure on season-points leader Fernando Alonso.

The Finn's fifth victory of the season — and seventh career win — left him 24 points behind Alonso in the season standings with five races left.

Alonso was second in a Renault, with third going to Raikkonen's teammate Juan Pablo Montoya. McLaren should have had a 1-2 sweep, but on the second-last of 58 laps, Montoya drove wide on a turn and let Alonso slip by.

Montoya nearly lost second on the previous lap when he spun after a bump from behind by Jordan driver Tiago Monteiro.

Renault's Giancarlo Fisichella was fourth, with fifth for BAR-Honda's Jenson Button and sixth for Jarno Trulli. The next race is September 4 in Monza, Italy.

``We were unlucky as a team, it could have been a 1-2,'' Raikkonen said. ``We just need to keep working hard and win more races and see where we wind up.''

Renault has a narrow edge over McLaren in the constructors' championship — 130-121.

Horrible weekend

Seven-time champion Michael Schumacher endured a horrible weekend. He skidded off in qualifying, started from 19th on the 20-car grid, and went off the track after 16 laps following a minor collision with Mark Webber of Williams-BMW.

The Ferrari driver sat out 19 laps while mechanics fixed his damaged steering, but returned to run about 15 laps more before retiring again after what amounted to an extra practice session.

``In the end it was not a surprise to us,'' Schumacher said of his car's poor weekend. ``We did not expect to be really competitive all weekend.''

The new Istanbul Park circuit, which caused problems in qualifying and practice with slick conditions from sand and dirt on the track, provided a mostly incident-free race. The biggest problem came off the track, where traffic jams backed up for several kilometres leading to the new circuit 40 kilometres on Istanbul's Asian side.

Raikkonen, who finished in 1 hour, 24 minutes and 34.454. seconds on the 5.3 kilometre circuit, lost the lead briefly during the first lap when Renault's Fishicella surged ahead from No. 2 on the grid. But the 25-year-old Finn passed him seconds later and never trailed from that point.

``You better go for it when you have a chance and trust your feelings,'' Raikkonen said of the passing move. ``It paid off well. I was quite confident we would have the speed, but you never know.''

Alonso started from third and never challenged the two McLarens — the quickest cars in the second half of the season — until Montoya's slip. McLaren has won three of the last four races, with the other win going to Alonso.

Montoya blamed Monterio for bumping him from behind. However, it could have been the Colombian's fault. He passed the Portuguese driver, and seconds later seemed to brake quickly entering a turn when a surprised Monteiro hit him from behind.

``It was a shame because we were looking good for the constructors' championship with a 1-2,'' Montoya said.

Officials were expecting a crowd of 75,000. Among the fans at the race were Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and former heavyweight champion Mike Tyson. Erdogan apologized for minor problems leading up to the race.

``Next year, we will be even more successful,'' Erdogan said. Narain 14th

Narain Karthikeyan, the Jordan driver took the 14th place. Narain, who had a disappointing qualifying returned with an improved show to finish just ahead of teammate Tiago Monteiro, who came last in a race.

Narain ended his race three laps behind the winner, but managed to record his 10th finish in 14 races of the season so far. — Agencies

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Sport