By Naomi Willemsen
April 8 2007

It was a Grand Prix filled with mixed feelings for Toyota with Jarno and Ralf finishing 7th and disappointing 15th respectively. McLaren driver Fernando Alonso drove an excellent race and takes a well deserved win.

The lights went out and McLaren’s Fernando Alonso made an excellent start, taking the lead from Felipe Massa. Lewis Hamilton took advantage of it and rushed into the corner overtaking both Ferrari’s. Both Ralf and Jarno had a bit of an unfortunate start although Jarno was able to get back one place that got him in 9^th. Ralf Schumacher was a bit more unfortunate and lost four places. A collision with Honda driver Jenson Button resulted in an extra pit stop for Liuzzi, driving in the Torro Rosso, to get a new nose. It didn’t take long before the first yellow flag was showed after a retirement, caused by braking problems, from Spykers’ Adrian Sutil.

A real fight was going on between Hamilton and Massa who were fighting for a second place, but the young McLaren driver was able to hold Massa behind him and even trick him into making a mistake. Massa tried to overtake him but ran very wide over the grass and lost two places to teammate Kimi Räikkönen and Nick Heidfeld driving  in the BMW-Sauber.

The race was only seven rounds young and this GP was already over for Spyker. After some very slow lap times Christijan Albers enters the pits while smoke is pouring out of the back of his car. His engine got overheated caused by being stuck in 3^rd gear for quite some time. Fernando, in the meantime,  was driving away from Hamilton and Räikkönen.

BMW was the first time to call in one of their drivers, Robert Kubica, for a planned pit stop. It didn’t go as smooth as planned as the team mounted the wrong left-rear tire. Wurz was doing better as he overtakes David Coulthard in front of Ralf Schumacher who climbed up to 13^th place. Jarno Trulli was the first man from Toyota to have his pit stop. He entered the pits from 9^th and rejoined in 12^th. Ralf came in immediately after Jarno and fell back to the 17^th place. Felipe Massa was still stuck behind Nick Heidfeld while Fernando Alonso set a fastest time, but it didn’t take long because he was ready to have his first stop. Alonso, Räikkönen and Hamilton were following to have theirs. These three rejoined the race in 2^nd, 6^th and 3^rd  respectively, while Nick Heidfeld was the race leader until the 22^nd round.

After Ralf’s pit stop he got stuck between the two Honda drivers. He tried many times to overtake Barrichello but it just didn’t work. Jarno was slowly driving away from Renault’s Heikki Kovalainen and drove a quiet second stint from his 8^th place. Ralf was very unfortunate as he had to have an unscheduled pit stop caused by a slow puncture….he rejoined in 19^th place and had difficulties gaining  places.

Lewis Hamilton started the second series of pit stops from 2^nd. Soon after that Alonso, Massa and Barrichello, Scott Speed and Anthony Davidson follow. Williams’ Alexander Wurz  is doing a good job pitting from 10^th place after starting from a disappointing 20^th place. David Coulthard was complaining about the brakes of his car and said he didn’t feel comfortable with it. He didn’t trust the car so he retired not long after that.

With 13 laps to go Williams driver Nico Rosberg was the next one to retire his race due to an engine failure, which was a pity because he was doing a good job driving from the 7^th place. Although it was a pity for Williams it wasn’t that bad for Toyota as Jarno moved up to the 7^th place which means two points.

Fernando Alonso  drove a great race on lonely heights and all he had to do was bring the car home safely. Lewis Hamilton, though, had it a bit tougher as Kimi Räikkönen was trying to push him into making a mistake. Nevertheless Lewis kept focused and stayed in front of Kimi the until the chequered flag finally came in sight. He got second place in front of Kimi Räikkönen, Nick Heidfeld and Felipe Massa.

Jarno Trulli drove a good race finishing 7^th although he had some technical problems in the end. Ralf Schumacher did not drive a race we are used to from him due to some balance problems and a puncture. However, a 7^th place shows that Toyota is going to right way and has the potential to improve. Hopefully we’ll see that next week in Manama, Sakhir during the 2007 Grand Prix of Bahrain!