Raikkonen on song at sepang

In Formula One's second race of the season Force India ticked off the biggest, burning question off their list on Sunday. Not just for their benefit, but also for all those doubters out there. After the disaster that was Melbourne, a finish in Malaysia, was obviously the main objective of the team. And Giancarlo Fisichella’s twelfth-place at the Sepang International Circuit illustrated the progress that Force India, erstwhile Spyker, has made in the past five months. Finishing ahead of the two Williams cars Nico Rosberg and Kazuki Nakajima and the two dawdling Super Aguris is a noticeable and irrefutable improvement that the Silverstonebased team has racked up over the past few months. For Ferrari, it was a confirmation of what they are capable of. They had the fastest car and the coolest driver. After Felipe Massa lost the race lead to teammate Kimi Raikkonen, a one-two for the Scuderia outfit looked ripe for the taking. But after Massa’s rear wheels locked up, it was left up to Raikkonen to do the needful. BMW’s Robert Kubica benefited from Massa’s error, coming second and McLaren’s Heikki Kovalainen finished the podium. On a hot and humid afternoon, the start for the two Force India drivers, Fisichella and Adrian Sutil, was conflicting. Sutil, who had a disappointing qualifying session on Saturday, found the gaps and the pace to leap from 20th to 14th within just five laps. He was set for a few more upgrades before a hydraulic problem sealed his fate. Sutil had no option but to switch the engine off and pull off the track and onto the grass. “Sutil had such a great start, especially after a difficult qualifying session. He was looking very good. Unfortunately, it was an instantaneous failure and there was nothing we could do. Fisi put up a very solid, midfield performance. It’s definitely the biggest positive we take from the race. We’ve got the base and hope to build on it now. We can start beating some of the teams out there and win some points,’’ Mike Gascoyne, chief technical officer, said. Seventeenth on the grid, the start wasn’t the best of times for the Italian driver. But after a tyre-change in the first stop, the race pace of the Ferrari-powered car was clear to see. “I had a miserable start. There was too much wheelspin and some problem with the clutch and I lost a lot of positions. I was also suffering a lot of understeer with graining on the soft tyres but after we made the switch to hard tyres in the first pitstop, things improved. I’m pretty happy with the way the car behaved,’’ a very tired-looking Fisichella said. The slow start could also be attributed to Fisichella’s slightly cautious approach to the race. Chuckling he admitted, “I was a little careful as I wanted to drive more than one lap.’’ Through the weekend, the VJM01 showed a very competitive race pace, as Fisichella drove the car to its limit and battled through the midfield pack and set a set of laptimes just over one second from the leaders. Fisichella was also, in a sense, able to extract his revenge over Honda’s Rubens Barrichello, who nudged him out of Q2 reckoning on Saturday. Barrichello finished 13th, one behind Fisi.

HOW THEY FINISHED

1. KIMI RAIKKONEN (Fin) Ferrari 1:31:18.555

2. ROBERT KUBICA (Pol) BMW Sauber +00:19.570

3. HEIKKI KOVALAINEN (Fin) McLaren 00:38.450

4. JARNO TRULLI (Ita) Toyota 00:45.832

5. LEWIS HAMILTON (GBR) McLaren 00:46.548

6. NICK HEIDFELD (Ger) BMW Sauber 00:49.833

7. MARK WEBBER (Aus) Red Bull 01:08.130

8. FERNANDO ALONSO (Esp) Renault 01:10.041

9. DAVID COULTHARD (GBR) Red Bull 01:16.220

10. JENSON BUTTON (GBR) Honda 01:26.214

11. NELSON PIQUET (Bra) Renault 01:32.202

12. GIANCARLO FISICHELLA (Ita) Force India 1 lap

13. RUBENS BARRICHELLO (Bra) Honda 1 lap

14. NICO ROSBERG (Ger) Williams 1 lap

15. ANTHONY DAVIDSON (GBR) Super Aguri 1 lap

16. TAKUMA SATO (Jpn) Super Aguri 2 laps

17. KAZUKI NAKAJIMA (Jpn) Williams 2 laps

Retired

Timo Glock (Ger) Toyota—1st lap after collision with Rosberg;

Sebastien Bourdais (Fra) Toro Rosso—1st lap, spun off track;

Adrian Sutil (Ger) Force India—6th lap, hydraulic problems;

Felipe Massa (Bra) Ferrari—31st lap, spun off track;

Sebastian Vettel (Ger) Toro Rosso—40th lap, engine failure;

Fastest Lap: Nick Heidfeld, 1:35.366, lap 55.

CHAMPIONSHIP STAKES Drivers

1. Lewis Hamilton (Britain) McLaren 14

2. Kimi Raikkonen (Finland) Ferrari 11

3. Nick Heidfeld (Germany) BMW Sauber 11

4. Heikki Kovalainen (Finland) McLaren 10

5. Robert Kubica (Poland) BMW Sauber 8

6. Nico Rosberg (Germany) Williams 6

7. Fernando Alonso (Spain) Renault 6

8. Jarno Trulli (Italy) Toyota 5

9. Kazuki Nakajima (Japan) Williams 3

10. Sebastien Bourdais (France) Toro Rosso 2

Constructors

1. McLaren 24

2. BMW Sauber 19

3. Ferrari 11