Raikkonen wins wet Chinese GP, Alonso 2nd

SHANGHAI, CHINA – Kimi Raikkonen scored a 9.8s second win over Fernando Alonso in the Chinese Grand Prix on Sunday to keep his and Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro’s hopes alive in the 2007 Formula One World Championship as major rival Lewis Hamilton slid off the pit access lane after 30 laps of the 56 lap race. Raikkonen was backed up by Felipe Massa in third place.

The race was full of drama as it started on a wet track – but not as wet as Fuji the weekend before – dried out before a small shower dampened it again around half distance. It then dried out again to the finish.

Hamilton led away from pole position with Raikkonen taking second and Massa third, but Alonso came around the outside of the second Ferrari to take third only to lose it again on the first lap. Alonso challenged Massa for the first few laps, as Hamilton pulled away out front, opening up an 8.6s lead by lap 14.

Behind, Raikkonen was pulling away from Massa, opening up a five second gap while Massa was shadowed by Alonso who was only a couple of seconds behind.

The first pit stops came on lap 15 when Hamilton came in, while the other contenders came in successively from lap 17 onwards, but all remained on what were by now fairly well-worn wet tires. After the last stop, Hamilton’s lead had been halved to four seconds, but the margin to Massa in third had now grown to 12s with Alonso slightly closer behind him.

Raikkonen and Alonso both pitted on the next lap and rejoined with the Finn 11s ahead of Alonso, who in turn had rejoined just ahead of Massa.

The leader, on the road, was Robert Kubica who had made just one pit stop after 25 laps but he led just one lap before rolling to a halt with a recurrence of hydraulic failure which had plagued the BMW Sauber team all weekend.

Raikkonen now led by 10s from Alonso in second place while Massa was in third. Alonso reduced Raikkonen’s lead to 7.9s over the remaining laps, but it was usually at least eight seconds. By contrast, Massa was falling back with graining tires to a 10s deficit behind the Spaniard, but then the tires cleaned themselves up and Massa set four fastest laps in the last five laps. He was 3.0s behind Alonso at the end.

The championship now heads to Interlagos on the outskirts of Sao Paulo in Brazil for the final round of the series, with Hamilton still leading the championship on 107 pts, from Alonso with 103 and Raikkonen still in with a chance on 100 pts.

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