The all-new Ferrari reasserted the old order last week at the Spanish Grand Prix. Michael Schumacher drove the F2003-GA to another flawless victory and all but wiped out McLaren’s early-season advantage at a stroke.
Schumacher held off a strong challenge from local hero Fernando Alonso in his Renault R23 to win by more than five seconds.
‘This was a perfect day for the championship and for the new car,†he said.
Ominously for Ferrari’s rivals, Schumacher claimed that he already had his new car running even faster than the F2002 in which he dominated the San Marino Grand Prix two weeks ago.
‘We expected a tough fight after the Renault performance in qualifying,†he said.
‘I really love this new car and it was the right decision to bring it as today I don’t think the old one would have made it.â€
Yet it was Alonso who brought the crowd to its feet with a superb drive, vaulting ahead of Rubens Barrichello’s Ferrari at the first of his three refuelling stops to take a second place.
Alonso and his teammate Jarno Trulli had performed strongly in qualifying to line up third and fourth on the grid behind the Ferraris, and their Michelin tyres seemed to hold an edge over the Ferraris’ Bridgestones in temperatures that rose to 32ÞC.
Schumacher’s 66th career victory was therefore all the more commendable, and it could hardly have been a better weekend for Ferrari, given McLaren’s difficulties.
Kimi Raikkonen qualified last after an off-track incident in practice and then smashed into the back of Antonio Pizzonia’s stalled Jaguar R4 on the starting grid, resulting in the safety car being deployed for the first five laps.
Raikkonen now leads the champion-ship by four points from Schumacher, but David Coulthard has dropped to fifth place after surviving a first-lap brush with Trulli and then spinning off in a collision with Jenson Button’s BAR-Honda.
Barrichello came in third, with the Williams-BMWs of Juan Pablo Montoya and Ralf Schumacher finishing fourth and fifth. The remaining points were scored by Cristiano da Matta’s Toyota, Mark Webber’s Jaguar and the Briton Ralph Firman in a Jordan-Ford. –