Ferrari Wins,
But It's The Wrong Car

Turkish Grand Prix
By Erik Nielsen

Photos courtesy and copyright Ferrari Media

Filipe Massa

Filipe Massa showed the field that it's not just the driver, but Ferrari is back as a constructor with just a few races left in the season. The young Brazilian won his first race and finished ahead of both driver's championship contenders. The 1-3 result for Ferrari went a long way to close the gap in the manufacturers' championship, but the tifosi seem to think that the wrong red car won.

While the die hard Ferrari fans may have been disappointed, regular race fans were given a Turkish delight as Alonso and Schumacher dueled for most of the race with the Spaniard just finishing a car length ahead to beat the German. The complainers in the crowd will bring up the point that if Schumacher had pitted ahead of Massa, he would have been on the top spot of the podium. But that's not the way it turned out and Alonso moved further out by two additional points to his rival. With four races left, this one will probably go down to the last race or at least that is what all of the race promoters are praying for.

Nicolas Todt, Felipe Massa and his parents

Jenson Button remained a one hit wonder and became the best of the rest to finish in fourth place. The Brit might be making people at home talk of knighthood, but please, if one win in 113 starts is all it takes, there may be more Brits throwing their bowlers in the ring. Forget the Queen, God help us all if that happens. The finish did give Honda an extension of bragging rights in Japan for another few weeks.

Pedro de la Rossa finished way back in fifth, but after losing the trash talking Columbian to the great redneck sport of the south, Ron Dennis is happy to be getting points from a paid driver, any paid driver. It probably didn't hurt Pedro's contract terms to finish ahead of Fisichella this weekend.

The Start

Ralf Schumacher and Rubens Barichello gave the crowd another battle to watch as the fiend went by as they fought over the last two points paying positions with the other German getting the better of the other Brazilian. Toyota was bragging briefly, then they remembered where Button-san finished. They've got to pull out of this mess sooner or later. They never won Le Mans and things are shaping up to have the same record in F1. It is funny that they paint their F1 cars in the same appliance white boring color that most of their Camrys are painted...

Jarno Trulli finished in ninth and collected another round of track information for Toyota. A shame that no one will probably look at it.

Michael Schumacher

Mark Webber had a bit of a smile on his face finishing in tenth place ahead of both BMWs. Still a shame that the team has fallen that far back in the pack.

Three of the four Red Bull family of cars finished, unfortunately for the drink maker, none of them finished in the points. But they did manage to get some TV time. Maybe it is worth the effort.

Both BMWs finished with the Pole in front of the German. Not to worry, invasion plans are being drawn up as you read this.

Michael Schumacher

With only four races left, things have more or less sorted themselves out. The driver's championship will go to either Schumacher or Alonso, Ferrari is testing bumpers at Fiorano this week, but it is still too close to call. Ferrari will probably pull it out and get the constructors championship since Fisichella isn't performing at the level he needs to with the battle for the lead as tight as it is right now. And unless it rains like hell during the next three races, there is a great chance that not-so-Super Aguri will not get a point this year. Too bad Villeneuve left, there is now a team out there that makes him look like he knew what he was doing!

F1 returns to Italy in two weeks for Monza, expect the tifosi to be there in force. If they get a chance to pour some extra virgin olive oil in the big drums that say Mobil-1, who knows what will happen. More than likely, it's going to be a close one.

Race Results

1	MASSA	Ferrari	1h28m51.082s
2	ALONSO	Renault	+ 5.5s
3	M.SCHUMACHER	Ferrari	+ 5.6s
4	BUTTON	Honda	+ 12.3s
5	DE LA ROSA	McLaren-Mercedes	+ 45.9s
6	FISICHELLA	Renault	+ 46.5s
7	R.SCHUMACHER	Toyota	+ 59.3s
8	BARRICHELLO	Honda	+ 60.0s
9	TRULLI	Toyota	+ 1 lap
10	WEBBER	Williams-Cosworth	+ 1 lap
11	KLIEN	RBR-Ferrari	+ 1 lap
12	KUBICA	Sauber-BMW	+ 1 lap
13	SPEED	STR-Cosworth	+ 1 lap
14	HEIDFELD	Sauber-BMW	+ 2 laps
15	COULTHARD	RBR-Ferrari	+ 3 laps
16	ALBERS	MF1-Toyota	+ 12 laps, accident
17	SATO	Super Aguri-Honda	+ 17 laps
18	ROSBERG	Williams-Cosworth	+ 33 laps, water pressure
19	YAMAMOTO	Super Aguri-Honda	+ 35 laps, spin
20	LIUZZI	STR-Cosworth	+ 46 laps, spin
21	RÄIKKÖNEN	McLaren-Mercedes	+ 57 laps, accident
22	MONTEIRO	MF1-Toyota	+ 58 laps, accident
Fastest Lap	M.SCHUMACHER	Ferrari	1m28.005s

Driver's Championship Standings

1	ALONSO	Renault	108 Points
2	M.SCHUMACHER	Ferrari	96 Points
3	MASSA	Ferrari	62 Points
4	FISICHELLA	Renault	52 Points
5	RÄIKKÖNEN	McLaren-Mercedes	49 Points
6	BUTTON	Honda	36 Points
7	MONTOYA	McLaren-Mercedes	26 Points
8	BARRICHELLO	Honda	22 Points
9	HEIDFELD	Sauber-BMW	19 Points
10	R.SCHUMACHER	Toyota	18 Points
11	DE LA ROSA	McLaren-Mercedes	14 Points
12	COULTHARD	RBR-Ferrari	14 Points
13	TRULLI	Toyota	10 Points
14	VILLENEUVE	Sauber-BMW	7 Points
15	WEBBER	Williams-Cosworth	6 Points
16	ROSBERG	Williams-Cosworth	4 Points
17	KLIEN	RBR-Ferrari	2 Points
18	LIUZZI	STR-Cosworth	1 Point

Constructor's Championship Standings

1	Renault	160 Points
2	Ferrari	158 Points
3	McLaren-Mercedes	89 Points
4	Honda	58 Points
5	Toyota	28 Points
6	Sauber-BMW	26 Points
7	RBR-Ferrari	16 Points
8	Williams-Cosworth	10 Points
9	STR-Cosworth	1 Point