Michael Schumacher won his ninth Grand Prix of the season at the redesigned Hockenheim circuit in Germany today in front of over 100,000 fans. Starting from pole the newly crowned World Champion led all the way to the chequered flag to the delight of his home supporters.
| Position | Driver | Team | Points |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Michael Schumacher (D) | Ferrari | 10 |
| 2 | Juan Pablo Montoya (COL) | Williams BMW | 6 |
| 3 | Ralf Schumacher (D) | Williams BMW | 4 |
| 4 | Rubens Barrichello (BR) | Ferrari | 3 |
| 5 | David Coulthard (GB) | McLaren Mercedes | 2 |
| 6 | Nick Heidfeld (D) | Sauber Petronas | 1 |
| Fastest Qualifier: Michael Schumacher (D) | |||
Complete GP of Germany results.
In the early part of the race his younger brother Ralf was close on his heels but a slow pit stop put an end to the challenge and he eventually fell to third after making an extra stop to have the pressurized air for his pneumatic valve actuators recharged just four laps from the end.
Ralf’s extra stop allowed his Williams team mate Juan Pablo Montoya to move into second place on the podium. Montoya completed one of the best moves of the day when he drove wheel-to-wheel with Kimi Raikkonen through several corners before finally pulling ahead of the McLaren and heading off into the distance.
Recently a race without Rubens Barrichello having a problem at the start has been as rare as a race that his Ferrari team mate didn’t win and today was no exception. After he had taken his place on the grid Barrichello’s mechanics noticed a problem with his car and he had to run back to the pits for the spare while his primary car was wheeled away. Luckily for Barrichello now that Michael Schumacher has won the championship the spare car is going to be set up for him for the rest of the year and so it was ready for him to jump straight into it. Even so he made it onto the track with just a few seconds to spare before the pit lane was closed and he would have been forced to start the race from the pit lane.
Unbelievably Rubens bad luck wasn’t finished yet and problems with his fuel rig on his second pit stop cost him extra seconds and dropped him to fourth place where he finished. Somewhere in Ferrari’s attic there must be a portrait of Rubens Barrichello or a voodoo doll in his likeness as it is uncanny how he can have so much bad luck while everything goes perfectly for his team mate.
David Coulthard was fifth for McLaren — having already been lapped by Schumacher — and Nick Heidfeld took the last point for Sauber in sixth.
There were an unusually high number of retirements only three other drivers were still running at the end — Felipe Massa (Sauber), Takuma Sato (Jordan) and Mika Salo (Toyota).
After not starting last week’s French Grand Prix the Arrows team was back on the grid but both Heinz-Harald Frentzen and Enrique Bernoldi suffered engine problems and neither was able to finish the race.
Once again the grid was incomplete as for the third time this year Alex Yoong failed to qualify his Minardi and so had to sit out the event.