By Naomi Willemsen
October 1 2006

Toyota suffered disappointment in the Chinese Grand Prix as both Jarno Trulli and Ralf Schumacher retired. Michael Schumacher Won the race ahead of reigning World Champion and title rival Fernando Alonso. Alonso's team mate Giancarlo Fisichella was Third. Alonso and Schumacher are now tied on 116 points with two race to go. The lights went out and everyone got from their place safe and sound. Kimi Räikkönen made a very good start as he overtook both Honda-drivers and almost Fisichella in the end of the first corner, from 5th place. Doornbos who was driving his first race for Red Bull wasn’t really lucky – in the first corner he collided with Robert Kubica and had to go to the pits for a new nose. Jarno was able to gain three places which put him down to the 14th place while Ralf stayed, behind Nico Rosberg, on his 16th place. Nevertheless Rosberg’s pace was slightly better and got the chance to overtake Jarno, with success. This would set the two Toyota’s behind each other during the first stint. Both Ralf and Jarno got very unlucky to get into a queue of traffic behind Nico Rosberg, David Coulthard, Scott Speed and some other drivers while their pace was getting better and better. After 9 laps Felipa Massa got closer to Ralf and tried to overtake him, but Ralf was determined not to let him go by that easily. In the end Massa succeeded passing by Ralf. At the same time Jarno was trying to overtake Rosberg in the last corner but had a bit of a moment and went off-line. Though this didn’t have any affect to his racing position. It wouldn’t take too long before the young Ferrari driver was able to get close enough to Jarno to overtake him. Trulli and Ralf were now 16th and 17th, and still stuck behind some drivers. In the meanwhile Kimi was gaining on Fisichella and was fighting for the third position. After increasing the pressure on Fisichella he finally got the chance to overtake him after twelve laps. Jenson Button was the first man to start with the pit stops as McLaren’s Räikkönen follows him into the pits. Which gives Fisichella his second place back, behind leader Fernando Alonso. As we have seen many times before Räikkönen was the unlucky one to retire with some problems with his throttle and engine. He was the first man to retire during the Chinese Grand Prix. Luck changed a bit for Alonso when he changed in his intermediate tires for slicks. He was losing a lot of ground against Fisichella and Michael Schumacher, who later both overtook Alonso. Although the Toyota’s gained places up to the 12th and 13th place, they were, unfortunately, quite invisible throughout the whole race. It was obvious they were doing a one-stopper. At first sight it looked even promising for them, but then they had to make the hard decision which had to do with tires. As the rest of the grid Toyota started with intermediates. There was forecasted rain in the race, but weather gods decided it was going to stay dry. They could only make one stop and change their tires to slicks. The problem was that it was too early for driving on dry tires. Nevertheless Toyota took the chance and put both Ralf and Jarno on slicks, they eventually had nothing to lose. It didn’t pay off; Jarno fell back to 19th because it still was too slippery to drive a good race. Ralf lost a lot of time in the first few laps, but in the end stage of the race it was improving and he was even possible to set a fastest lap twice of 1.40.3 and 1.39.823. He, after he race, got the 11th fastest time. Alonso’s second pitstop wouldn’t make the situation any better as an engineer had a problem putting on the right rear tire. This cost him much time and fell back to the 6th place. After thirteen laps the tires are working better and better and gains four places, which put him up to second again. Elsewhere, Jarno was disappearing from the race and finally had to give up due to pneumatic problems in lap 41, while Ralf Schumacher was closing in on Doornbos. A collision with David Coulthard caused a broken left-front suspension from the Ferrari from Felipe Massa and had no choice but giving up his race in lap 46 from p10. As bad as Toyota’s race was Ralf was having problems with the oil pressure spike, which wasn’t repairable during the race, and because of that he retired. Just before the end of the race Button chases for Nick Heidfeld for p4 and suddenly Takuma Sato almost parks his car in front of Heidfeld which makes Barichello hit the BMW. With result that Jenson Button and Rubens Barichello finished 4th and 5th and Nick Heidfeld fell back to 7th. After a 56 laps long race Michael Schumacher crossed the finish line as leader of the 2006 Chinese Grand Prix. With Fernando Alonso and Gian Carlo Fisichella behind him in 2nd and 3rd place. Overall this wasn’t a race to be proud of for Toyota. With next week Toyota’s home Grand Prix the team looks forward to some more luck and a stronger race.