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Formula One
F1: Silverstone a Lewis Hamilton Masterclass
McLaren man shines as rivals struggle in wet track; Heidfeld and Barrichello complete podium as championship comes to three-way tie.
Kevin Krefting  |  Posted July 06, 2008   Northamptonshire, UK
Hamilton passed Kovalainen for the lead on lap five and never looked back. (LAT Photo)

McLaren’s Lewis Hamilton brought down the house at Silverstone, spanking the competition en route to his maiden home victory in the British Grand Prix.

Hamilton crossed the finish line more than a minute ahead of his nearest chaser, BMW’s Nick Heidfeld, who equally didn’t put a wheel wrong in the chaotic wet conditions to finish second. The race’s biggest star besides Hamilton, however, was Honda’s Rubens Barrichello, who showed his usual wet-track prowess to post his first top-three result since 2005, when he was still a Ferrari driver.

The Scuderia for its part had a disastrous day in Britain, its only consolation being Kimi Raikkonen’s fourth-place finish (despite a couple of spins) that brings the championship to a three-way tie between the Finn, Hamilton and Felipe Massa, all equal at 48 points now.

Hamilton began to show his determination to win at the start, when he benefited from outside polesitter Mark Webber (Red Bull) taking a defensive line against Raikkonen. The McLaren driver jumped to second and challenged teammate and P1 starter Heikki Kovalainen at Stowe, the pair touching slightly at the turn’s exit as the Finn held on to his lead.

On a wet track but with no rain, the entire field started on intermediate tires, which proved not enough to cope with the water for some. Webber was the first victim with Massa, the points leader entering the weekend, following soon after. Red Bull’s David Coulthard and Toro Rosso’s Sebastian Vettel also spun on the first lap and had less luck, ending up in the gravel trap.
Hamilton now leads the championship on a tie-breaker with Massa and Raikkonen. (LAT Photo)

Lap four showed it wouldn’t be Massa’s day as the Brazilian spun again, the second of five spins he’d have in the afternoon. One lap later, Hamilton’s pressure on Kovalainen was successful and the Brit made the local crowd wild by moving up to the lead – a position he wouldn’t relinquish till the checkered flag.

On the 11th lap it was Kovalainen’s turn to spin and rejoin, and when the dust settled from the opening chaos, Hamilton led Raikkonen and Kovalainen, then came Renault’s Fernando Alonso, Heidfeld, Nelson Piquet in the second Renault, Toyota’s Jarno Trullo and BMW’s Robert Kubica.

The wet track continued to make victims, with Force India’s Adrian Sutil spinning spectacularly in front of Toro Rosso’s Sebastien Bourdais on lap 12. Six laps later, Webber kicked off the first round of pit stops.

Up front, Raikkonen was reeling on Hamilton, bringing the gap between the two to less than a second. The pair pitted together on lap 20, and with more rain being forecasted, McLaren put new intermediates on Hamilton’s car. Ferrari, however, chose to gamble on a drying track and kept Kimi on his worn inters, which work better on drier surfaces than new ones.
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