After losing the lead to Michael, when Michael was able to return to the track from his pit stop ahead of Ralf, the younger Schumacher was not able to find a way past the Ferrari. In the end he had to settle for second.

In the post race interviews Ralf would say: "I'm a bit disappointed. We had the race pace. I can't see where he took the gap. Maybe he was in a different race. In 2001 I won it like this, now it's his turn."

But Ralf has also had to defend himself from some criticism that he did not make any passing moves against his brother in the closing stages of the race. Especially in light of how easily team-mate Juan Pablo had been able to close in on the two Schumacher's it appeared that the FW25 was quicker than the Ferrari in front. It was also later revealed that Michael was also struggling with brake problems.

Even Frank Williams suggested if the situations had been reversed with Juan Pablo behind the Ferrari that we may have seen some attempts to pass.

Williams said: "I've got to be careful what I say, but possibly to probably Juan would have had a bigger go. But I'm not so sure that he could have got close enough to have a go."

Ralf responded to this by saying that he had not given his brother an easy ride to the finish.

Ralf said: "I was never close to even try, that's why I didn't. Maybe some might think again that I took it too easy but if there is no possibility I won't try it.

"There's eight points for the team and for me and for Juan as well so it was important for us to score points at the same time."